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Gustavus Adolphus. 



THE LIFE 



,1 



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OP 



Gustavus-Adolphus. 



BY 



REV. L. W. HEYDENREICH. 



GRADUATE OF THE UNIVEESITT OF FRANCE. 



L V 



1 I 



r- 




PHILADELPHIA: 
i-.xja?iiER,A]Nr BDAR,r) of publication, 

42 NOKTH NINTH STSEET. 

CLAXTON, EEMSEN & HAFFELFINGER. 

1868. 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868, by 

The Lutheran Publication Board, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court, for the Eastern District of 

Pennsylvania. 



JAS. B. RODGERS, 

ELKCTF.OTYPEK AND PEINTEH, 

62 & 5i North Sixth Street, Philada. 



PEEFACE. 



Ii^ coir^osing this Life of Gustavus-Adolphus, tlie under- 
signed used 

1. "Vie de Gustave-Adolphe par L. Abelous," 
published by the Paris Agency of the Society of Sunday- 
schools, which he translated and which forms the basis 
of this volume. 

2. "Geschichte Gustav-Adolph's von Andkeas 
Fryxell." Nach der vierten auslage, des Schwedischen 
Originals. Leipzig, 1859. 

3. " Das Leben des Christlichen Helden Gustav- 
Adolf Kcenigs von Schweden," published by the 
American Tract Society. 

4. And Schiller's "Thirty Years' War." The 
classical descriptions of the sack of Magdeburg, of the 
battles of Leipzig and Lutzen, and a few other passages 
of minor importance, contained in this work, were trans- 
ferred to this volume from Kev. A. S. W. Morrison's ex- 
cellent translations. 

This life of the great King of Sweden, being chiefly 
designed for Sunday-schools, the author thought it proper 
to say but little of the wars which Gustavus-Adolphus 



IV PREFACE. 

■waged against Poland, Russia, etc., because they contain 
no events whidi might awaken the religious interest of 
young readers, and to restrict himself to relating the part 
"which this Christian hero took in the bloody contest, car- 
ried on in Germany, during thirty years, for the cause of 
religious liberty. 

The undersigned cherishes the hope that the narrative 
of the achievements of this great captain, will inspire 
every evangelical Christian, no matter to "which denomi- 
nation he may belong, with respect toward the Mother- 
Church of Reformation, which, under this leader, fought 
' successfully the great battle for liberty of conscience. 

Lutherans, by pondering on the faithfulness exhibited 
by their brethren of former generations, during the perse- 
cutions "which they had to endure for the Gospel's sake, 
"will feel their attachment to their Zion increased, and 
actuated to promote her welfare to their best ability. 

May the Lord bless this feeble attempt, and cause it to 
contribute to the glory of His holy name. 

L. W. Heydexreich. 

Wilm'.njton, X. C, Fehruary \st, 18G8. 



Gustayus-Adolphus 



CHAPTER I. 




CHILD HO OB OF G U8TA VUS-AD OLPHUS. 

HIS DESCENT — HIS EDUCATION — HIS DISPOSITION. 

USTAYUS-ADOLPHUS, one of the greatest 
names of modern history, and one of the brightest 
glories of the Reformation, was an excellent king, 
a celebrated captain, and an accomplished Christian. 
His untimely death, and the importance of the events 
of which he was the hero, add new lustre to his virtues 
and genius. He presents to us a rare example of con- 
stant piety, in a position in which the soul is exposed 
to as many dangers as the body. Ha proves that 
Protestantism may unite gallantry :svith faith ; and with 
the Colignys, the Diiquesnes, the Havelocks, the 
Yicars, he shows the power of religion drawn without 
alloy from the divine source of the Bible. 

He was born in Stockholm, December 9th, 1594. 
Through his father, Charles, Duke of Sudermania, 
the youngest son of Gustavus Vasa, he was connected 
with the royal family of Sweden ; and, through his 



b GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

motlier, Christina, daughter of the Duke of Schleswig- 
Holstein, he was allied to the Danish dynasty. 
Notwithstandins: his illustrious orif^^in, the storm 
roared, as it were, around his cradle, and his child- 
hood Tvas as agitated as his later life; for during the 
whole sixteenth century, Sweden was disturbed by 
wars and convulsed by intense civil commotions. 

This country, which, by the compact of Calmar, had 
becom,e, in 1397, a dependence of Denmark, had only 
reluctantly submitted to alien rulers ; and, after an 
ineffectual attempt to shake off the foreign yoke, had 
rallied around Gustavus Yasa. This young man, 
whose father had fallen a victim to the blood-thirstiness 
of Christian II., had conceived the bold project of liber- 
ating his country from the tyranny to which it was 
subjected. Pursued by the oppressors of Sweden, 
he took refuge in Dalecarlia, urged the inhabitants of 
this province to an insurrection, and, with the help of 
these sturdy and courageous mountaineers, expelled 
the Danes from his countrv, to which he restored its 
liberty. His grateful compatriots having elected him 
king, this prince, enlightened by Olalis Petri, a disci- 
ple of Luther, introduced the Reformation in his 
dominions, in spite of the opposition which he expe- 
rienced from the clergy and the nobility. To serve 
God, according to His law, and to love Him above all; 
to believe in Jesus Christ, as our only Saviour ; to 
study, and earnestly teach the word of God ; to love 
our neighbor as ourselves, and to observe the ten 
commandments ; this is the true worship which is to 
be rendered to God — in this consists good works — 



> GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 7 

God lias not prescribed others ; the Scriptures speak 
neither of tapers, nor of palms, nor of masses for the 
redemption of souls, nor of the worship of saints. 
God, on the contrary, has prohibited such practices. 
He has given us the holy sacrament, as a pledge 
and token of the forgiveness of our sins ; but not that 
we should put it into a gold or silver frame and carry 
it about to cemeteries and other places. This was 
Gustavas Vasa's profession of faith, which suffices 
to justify his change of religion and that of his 
subjects. To devote himself entirely to the salvation 
of his soul, and to prepare to meet his God, since 
declining strength admonished him of approaching 
death, he abdicated in favor of his son Eric. He died 
shortly afterwards, regretted by his countrymen, and 
leaving Sweden a happy and prosperous kingdom. 
Eric inherited the power, but not the genius of his 
father. At the commencement of his reign, he quar- 
relled with his brothers, who, being invested with 
hereditary duchies, gave umbrage to him. Subject 
to frequent fits of folly, he was by turns, whimsical 
and cruel, as is exemplified by his asking in marriage, 
at the same time, Elizabeth, Queen of England, Mary 
Stuart, Queen of Scotland, the princess Renee, of 
Lorraine, Christina of Hessen, and finally marrying 
the daughter of a peasant ; or stabbing, with the cool- 
ness of a savage, on imaginary suspicions, Nicolas 
Sture, one of Sweden's noblest sons — then shedding, 
a few days later, tears of remorse, and refusing all 
food. All these excesses, joined to other ruinous 
extravagances, caused the representatives of the 



8 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

Swedish nation to declare Eric incapable of reigning, 
and to condemn him to an imprisonment which short- 
ened his life. The children of this monarch were 
excluded from the succession, and his brother John 
ascended the throne. But influenced by his wife, 
Catharine Jao;ellon, dauo;hter of Siorismund, Kino; of 
Poland, John called the Jesuits into his States and 
attempted to restore the Romish Church. The nation, 
indignant at his treachery, withdrew from him their 
sympathy and confidence. 

At John's death, the States, anxious to maintain 
their rights and the faith of the kingdom, required of 
his son Sigismund, who had been brought up in 
Poland, and instructed in the Catholic principles of 
his mother, a decree prohibiting any religion except 
Lutheranism. These energetic measures induced the 
new king to yield. But he soon violated his promise, 
and ordered a Catholic church to be built in each 
town of his kingdom. To render his perjury still 
more glaring, he refused to be crowned by a Pro- 
testant prelate, and granted this honor to the Pope's 
Nuncio. Then all Sweden protested against so 
much audacity, united with so much perfidy. Sur- 
rounded by Poles and Jesuits, Sigismund shocked 
both the national and religious feelings of his subjects. 
Bloody afi"rays took place between the inhabitants of 
Stockholm and the foreisiners. In the midst of these 
intestine contests, Sigismund, recalled by Poland, 
whose king he was also, left Sweden, to return no 
more. The Duke Charles, youngest son of Gustavus 
Yasa, and Sigismund's uncle, was the only one who 



GrSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 9' 

showed himself worthy of his father, and the only 
son who had conciliated the affection and esteem of 
his countrymen. The interests of his fellow-citizens, 
and the dangers which threatened his religion, silenced 
his scruples, and caused him to yield to the desire of 
the Estates by accepting the regency of the kingdom, 
to the great joy of the people, whose friend and hope 
he was for a long time. The Augsburg Confession 
was again proclaimed, and all the Swedes present 
cried: "Our persons and our property, all that we 
have in this world, we wi]l sacrifice, if it is necessary, 
rather than abandon the pure Gospel!" 

During these storms Gustavus-Adolphus was born. 
His baptism, celebrated on the first of January, 1595, 
gave rise to public rejoicings. People took pleasure 
in relating that ten years before this happy day, the 
renowned astronomer Tycho-Brahe had foretold the 
birth of a prince, who would render illustrious the 
States of Northern Europe and save the evangelical 
Church. Without dwelling on such legends, we see in 
them the superstitious, but sincere expression of the 
enthusiasm, which greeted the heir of the Duke of 
Sudermania and foreboded his future elevation. 

The child, according to a biblical expression, grew 
and waxed strong in spirit. His brilliant qualities 
were developed under the beneficial influence of his 
parents. Bravery and a predilection for the military 
profession soon manifested themselves in him. This 
disposition was early developed by the accounts Gus- 
tavus received from his father of the wars continually 
engrossing his attention, often causing long and fre- 



'10 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

quent absences from home, and wlio thus inflamed the 
imagination of his son and fostered his warlike in- 
clination. 

In September, 1595, the national assembly of Swe- 
den, the Diet, had excluded from the throne every 
Catholic candidate. Sigismund refused to subscribe to 
this condition, pretending to maintain the rights which 
his father had bequeathed to him. His religious con- 
victions had allowed him to obtain the inheritance of 
his mother and to reign over Poland. He hoped to 
possess also the crown of Sweden without renouncing 
the tenets of Rome. He invaded this kingdom and 
tried to obtain it by force. But a decisive defeat 
obliged him to withdraw, after having signed a capitula- 
tion which was tantamount to an abdication. His 
uncle and conqueror, who as yet had only been regent, 
now became king under the name of Charles IX., and 
his descendants were proclaimed by the Estates the 
only legitimate heirs to the throne of Sweden. Charles 
had already once refused to replace his nephew, and 
in yielding to the renewed entreaties of his country 
and to the force of circumstances, he wished to ease his 
conscience. He remarked to the deputies of the nation 
that if one of Sio;ismund's sons would embrace the 
Reformation, he should inherit the crown. He re- 
located in his will this generous reservation. In com- 
paring this scrupulousness with Sigismund' s conduct, 
who trampled on all his engagements, it is impossible 
not to recognize in the king of Poland the disciple of 
the Jesuits, and in Charles the disciple of a religion 
which above all speaks to the conscience. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. ll 

After the war against the Polish invaders, Charles 
had been obliged to defend his power on the continent. 
Finland, urged to rebellion by Sigismund's intrigues, 
submitted only after a bloody contest. Gustavus, who 
was scarcely seven years old, accompanied his father 
in this expedition. The ship on board of which they 
were embarked, became ice-bound, and the child was 
obliged to continue his way on foot in the midst of a 
rigorous Russian winter. The vigor of his constitu- 
tion overcame this obstacle, which did not impair his 
health. 

A fact is reported which shows that his soul was as 
intrepid as his body. He took a walk in a meadow 
near Stockholm, and while playing there with perfect 
freedom, he ran toward a copse very distant from the 
persons who were watching over him. They, trying 
to stop him with stories of large snakes concealed in 
the wood, were answered: "Well, give me a stick, I 
will kill them." 

He was much pleased with the military preparations, 
and thus revealed, from his infancy, his disposition 
for the profession of arms. In visiting with his 
father, the Swedish fleet, at Calmar, he was called 
upon by an officer, who asked him, when the tour of 
all the ships had been made, which one he preferred : 
"The Black Knight," said he, (this was the name of 
one of the vessels) ; when asked the reason, he immedi- 
ately replied : " Because it carries more guns than 
the others." 

Another fact, which also took place in his child- 
hood, betokens a generosity not less remarkable than 



12 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

his strength and courage. A peasant once brought 
to him a pretty little pony of the island of (Eland, 
whose horses are renowned in all northern Europe. 
This worthy man requested the prince to accept his 
nag as a small token of his devotion. " I keep your 
horse," said Gustavus to him, ''but I will pay you for 
it, you are in want of money, aiid this present exceeds 
your resources." While saying this, he brought out 
his purse full of ducats and emptied the contents of it 
into the hand of the countryman, who was stupefied at 
the sight of such disinterestedness and liberality in a 
child. 

The intellect of Gustavus was above all surprising. 
Before he was sixteen years old, he had studied six 
languages. He knew equally well the Swedish, Latin, 
German, Dutch, French, and Italian tongues. He 
could also speak the Russian and the Polish to some 
extent. His father however did not confine himself to 
cultivating his intellect, but took special care of his 
heart. He inspired him with a love for labor, and 
trained him to the practice of all those virtues which 
make great men and good Christians. His religious 
instruction was thorough, enabling him to account 
for his faith, though its object was not so much to ex- 
plain the principles of the Reformation as to endear 
them to his heart. In one word, Charles IX. spared 
nothing to render his son capable and , worthy of 
governing Sweden. 

The letter is still extant in which this wise monarch 
gave to his son, with his last farewell, his last advice. 
"Above all," said he to him, " fear God ; honor thy 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 13 

father and tliy mother ; show for thy brothers and 
sisters a deep attachment ; love the faithful servants 
of thy father, and reward each one according to his 
merits; be humane towards thy subjects; punish 
the 'wicked ; love the good ; trust everybody, 
though not unreservedly, observe the laws without 
respect to persons; injure nobody's well acquired 
privileges, if they are consistent with the law." 

In this simple and austere language we find those 
maxims which moulded noble and resolute characters, 
men of granite, whose sublime type the effeminacy of 
our age has effaced. 

The mother of Grustavus-Adolphus also contributed 
to the development of his numerous gifts. She per- 
fectly seconded her husband and carefully avoided 
those dangerous allowances, which an indulgent love 
too often suggests to mothers. Severe and perhaps a 
little haughty, she would not suffer the least violation 
of her rule. Her virtues exerted the most happy 
influence on all, and thus the court was not dangerous 
to her sons. 

She had a very decided predilection for her second 
son, Charles-Philip. Her conduct might have wound- 
ed the affection of the elder and caused disunion in 
the family, but Gustavus was too good a son to com- 
plain of his mother, and too good a brother to be 
jealous. 

To complete the education of Gustavus, Charles 
thought it best to accustom him early to the manage- 
ment of affairs and to a practical life which books have 
never taught. When Adolphus was ten years old, his 
2 



14 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

fatHer made him attend tlie meetings of the counsellors 
of the crown, and the diJ0ferent public assemblies. He 
even allowed him to converse, in his presence, with 
the foreign officers, who from time to time were present 
at these sittings. He loved to hear the joung prince 
speak of battles, sieges, military organizations, like an 
old general, and ask questions with the eagerness of a 
child whose curiosity never grows weary. 

At the age of fourteen, the king sent him, with his 
mother, into northern Sweden to become acquainted 
with his future subjects. He recommended him to 
listen to all who would solicit his protection, to help 
them according to his means, and to dismiss none 
without comfort. This journey resulted in a complete 
success. When he was fifteen years old, he wished to 
lead an army against the Russians, but his services 
were not accepted, and the campaign took place with- 
out him. 

However, when, in April, 1611, Denmark had 
declared war against Sweden, Gustavus-Adolphus ob- 
tained the command of a body of troops. He immedi- 
ately marched forward to deliver the town of Calmar, 
which was besieged by the Danes. From the begin- 
ning to the end of this war, he displayed the talents of 
a great captain, and directed all the operations in an 
admirable manner. The confidence, which he had 
inspired, was such that the King departed to hold a 
diet, and left him alone at the head of the army. 

Charles had no sooner started, than he became dan- 
gerously ill. "When no hope for his recovery could be 
any longer entertained, his attendants lamented over 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 15 

the misfortunes which his death would cause to Sweden, 
and over the works which he would leave unfinished. 
Then the old king, placing his hand upon his son's 
head, who had come to his father's death-bed, said 
with a voice feeble, but full of conviction : " Ille faciet 
(this one will do it)." He died on the 10th of Octo- 
ber, 1611, sixtj-one years of age. 



CHAPTEE II. 




G USTA VUS-AD OLPH US' EEIGN: 

niS GALLANTRY — HIS DOMESTIC YIRTUES — HIS PIETY, 

LTHOUGH Gustavus Adolphus was only seven- 
. teen years old, when lie succeeded liis father, lie 
was declared to have attained his majority. His 
precocious maturity rendered him worthy of this ex- 
ception. His ability had been tested in the war which 
the nation had sustained against the Danes. He con- 
tinued the struggle successfully, and the king of Den- 
mark renounced his claims to the throne of Sweden. 
He had scarcely concluded peace with this prince, 
when he was called into Russia, to support the party 
that had oifered the crown of this country to his 
brother. 

The competitor of Charles-Philip was Uladislas, 
son of Sigismund, king of Poland, lately dethroned in 
Sweden. To bring their divisions to an end the Rus- 
sians rejected these two princes, and elected by com- 
mon consent a chief among themselves. Gustavus- 
Adolphus consented to peace, and obtained an increase 
of territory which the new sovereign ceded to him. 
This short war had been a severe school to the young 
king of Sweden ; he had fought under his valiant con- 
stable, James de la Gardie, whose gallantry had struck 

16 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 17 

tlie Russians to sucli a degree, that they put his name 
in their calendar, thus conferring religious honors upon 
him. 

After having improved his rare military talents hy 
experience, Gustavus-Adolphus, seconded by brave 
and distinguished Generals, easily conquered Sigis- 
mund, the unrelenting enemy of his race, who had 
already possessed himself of one of his continental 
provinces. He forced him to retreat, and even took 
several towns from Prussia, which had favored that 
king. 

All these victories rendered his power secure, which' 
had been threatened on all sides. The disinterested- 
ness of the Swedes, whose devotion to their king did 
not shrink from any sacrifice, united to a wise adminis- 
tration, replenished the treasury exhausted by so 
many wars. 

It has been remarked that no king ever took the 
reins of government under more difficult circum- 
stances than Gustavus-Adolphus.* TVe must add that 
no one ever overcame obstacles so rapidly. He was 
obliged to conquer his inheritance in some manner, and 
to pay with his blood his claims to the throne. He 
drew not his sword actuated by a spirit of conquest ; 
the interest of his country was his sole incentive, and 
he only waged war to secure peace. He repressed 
with decision every deed of vengeance, and thus pre- 
sents an example of courage during the battle and of 



* Money was so scarce that, to carry on the war, Gustavus sold 
his gold and silver plate and his jewels. Many great personages 
imitated his example. 

2* 



18 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

generosity after the triumph. Pull of solicitude for 
his soldiers he tolerated no licentiousness and upheld 
religion and morals in his camp. Divine service was 
regularly celebrated. In the morning and in the 
evening, the whole army bent their knees before God 
and implored His blessing. The king multiplied him- 
self. He was everywhere found dispensing encourage- 
ments and counsels, putting even his hand to the work, 
taking the lead in the bloody conflicts, and handling 
the pickaxe in the trenches. He maintained disci- 
pline, out abolished bastinado, and thus showed more 
solicitude for the dignity of man, than is exhibited, at 
the present day, in some civilized countries. As pru- 
dent as he was brave, he surrounded himself with wise 
counsellors, and, before every undertaking, always 
consulted the Estates of his kingdom. 

His energy and the strength of his constitution are 
inconceivable. Whether sick or wounded, he never 
complained, and even ~ did not take care of himself. 
During the Russian war, he was attacked by an inter- 
mittent fever. Far from keeping his bed, he enjoyed 
himself in fencing with an officer of his court, and 
carried on this exercise with so much earnestness as 
to produce a copious perspiration, which cured him of 
his disease. 

Providence visibly protected his life and preserved 
him for great purposes. During the Livonian cam- 
paign against the Poles, a bullet swept the place that 
lie had just left. At another time, a number of 
persons fell at his side struck by grape shot, and so 
near him that blood gushed on his garments. A 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 19 

moment later, a ball crossed his tent and passed over 
liis head. At Dantzig, lie ordered seven boats to take 
a redoubt, and, to be surer of the result, he himself 
commanded one of these crafts. He vras shot in the 
abdomen. Xot"withstanding the severity of the wound, 
he Tvrote on that very day to the Estates: "As the 
engagement was warm. I also was wounded ; I thank 
God that my health and life are not endangered, and 
hope that, in a few days, I shall be able to resume the 
command." His friends, fearinir that greater misfor- 
tune might happen to him in future, entreated him 
through Oxenstiern henceforth not to expose his life 
anymore. Gustavus answered: ^^As yet no king has 
lost his life by a bullet, moreover the soldier folloi^s 
the example of his leader, and a general who shrinks 
from dancrer, will never cover himself with crlorv. 
Cassar was alwavs to be found in the first rank, 
and Alexander moistened each battle-field with his 
blood." Three months later he was again seriously 
wounded in a battle which he fous:ht in Prussia ao-ainst 
the Duke of Brandenburg, a vassal and an ally of his 
rival, the King of Poland. The day after this accident 
he wrote, as at Dantzig, a letter remarkable for the 
courage and the resignation which it breathes: ''We 
met," said he, "the enemy on foot and horseback; 
our artillery made such execution that we thought we 
had put him to flight, but God would not have it ; when 
we had arrived at a pass from which we wanted to 
dislodge him, a musket ball struck me at the shoulder 
near the neck ; this was the chief cause of our losing 
the battle. I thank God however for allowing me, in 



20 . GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

mj misfortune, to hope for mj speedy restoration to 
health." 

The V.ing's fearlessness and courage inspired indeed 
his soldiers with the highest admiration for him, and 
actuated them to follow his example, but his generals, 
anticipating the fatal consequences which his untimely 
death would inflict upon his cause, did not approve of 
his temerity. Therefore they again besought him 
through Oxenstiern, their spokesman, to consider of 
what importance his life was to the country, and not 
to expose himself so often as he had done of late. 
Gustavus-Adolphus answered: "My friends, I cannot 
believe, that my person is of so great a consequence 
as you pretend. For should the worst befall me, I 
am nevertheless fully convinced that God would 
henceforth watch over Sweden as he has done hitherto. 
And as God has made me king, I dare not allow my- 
self to be frightened or to be actuated by my own ad- 
vantage. Should, in the vicissitude of war, death be 
my lot, how can a king fall more honorably than in 
the contest for God and his people." When once a 
surgeon, while dressing his wound, dared to make to 
him similar remonstrances, Gustavus contented him* 
self with answering: "iVe sutor ultra crepidamT' 
Every one to his own trade. 

Towards the end of the same war against Poland 
and Russia, Gustavus-Adolphus incurred another 
great danger. An Austrian army, composed of eight 
thousand men of infantry, and two thousand men of 
cavalry, having come to the aid of Poland, the king of 
Sweden asked Wallenstein, Duke of Friedland, who 



J 



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J 


1 






1 


1 




I i^eek to fi.rtifv mvself, by meditations upon the Holy Scriptures.— p. 20.) 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 21 

had sent him, and what motive actuated Austria to 
meddle with his affairs. Wallenstein arrogantly an- 
swered : "The Emperor, my master, has more soldiers 
than he wants for himself; he must help his friends." 
To fight these new adversaries, the King of Sweden 
was in need of reinforcements, and, in the meantime, 
he wished to take shelter behind the ramparts of 
Marienburg, one of the cities which he had taken from 
the Prussians. But one of his generals was led into a 
fight against the Imperialists, thus exposing his divi- 
sion to full destruction. The Swedish battalions were 
already giving way before Wallenstein's soldiers, 
when Gustavus-Adolphus, informed of the imminent 
defeat, made haste 'to succor them. Involved in the 
rout, and lost, as it were, in the tumult, he was in 
danger of being made a prisoner by one of the enemy's 
cavalry, w^hose sword grazed his head and knocked off 
his hat. Escaping, with difficulty, from this peril, he 
fell into the hands of another rider, who seized him by 
the arm. It would have been all over with him, if a 
Swedish dragoon had not, by a timely intervention, 
killed the Austrian. 

Gustavus-Adolphus was always very grateful for 
this divme protection, and relied on it unreservedly. 
In the most bloody battles, as in his palace, he felt 
himself under the all-seeing eye of God, and commit- 
ted his life to His care. He used to say: " God has 
given me a crown, not to dread or to rest, but to 
devote my life to His glory, and to the happiness of 
my subjects." God's glory was indeed the only aim 
of all the acts of Gustavus-Adolphus. His i'aith 



22 aUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

sliines forth in all liis words. The cause of the gospel 
was his own, and its triumph his dearest wish. Master 
of Prussia, as far as Dantzig, he everywhere expelled 
the Jesuits, and publicly declared himself the Protec- 
tor of the evangelical faith. His first care was to 
write to the governors of the conquered country to 
restore to the Protestants the places of worship, which 
the Catholics had taken from them. He recommended 
the ministers to preach Grod's word faithfully, to 
administer the communion carefully, and to awaken 
everywhere Christian life. A synod was to meet 
every year, to provide for the administration of the 
Churches, common schools, and the higher instruction 
of the youth. 

He could not bear swearing, and frivolous and dis- 
respectful expressions about religion. He was often 
found alone, reading the Bible. On such occasions, 
he would say: "I try to strengthen myself, by^the 
meditation of Holy Writ, against perverse seducers. 
A man of my rank has to account for his actions to 
God only ; and, it is precisely this independence, 
which produces many temptations, against which we 
are never sufficiently on our guard." 

Gustavus-Adolphus was, in the purity of his morals, 
a model for all his soldiers. "He devoted," accord- 
ing to the testimony of a historian, ''all his time and 
strength to action ; none to pleasure ; and was always 
great." 

Before Riga, which had defended itself to the last 
extremity, the Swedish army had experienced severe 
losses, and therefore, it was expected, that a dreadful 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 23 

punishment Tronld be inflicted upon this town. But, 
Gustavus Adolphus showed also, on this occasion, 
his evangelical feelings. He treated the conquered 
"with the greatest mildness, and his admirable conduct 
astonished both his friends and his enemies. 

His domestic life was as beautiful as his public life. 
Gentle and afi'ectionate toward all his relations, he was, 
to his mother, the most affectionate and respectful son. 
Power did not chano-e his feelino-s in this resiard. 

a o o 

Long after his accession to the throne, he requested 
her not to leave him. 

After the siege of Riga, his brother, Charles- 
Philip, having been taken ill, Gustavus attended him 
so assiduously and so fondly, that the young duke wrote 
to his sister Catharine: "The king's conversation is 
so interesting, and his society so pleasant, that I do not 
think of my evil." The death of this prince wrung his 
heart. He breathed forth his regrets in a touching 
letter, in which he said: "His heart was not dejected 
by misfortunes and reverses. In spite of his youth, 
he loved his country too much to remain at home. 
And when Sweden was attacked by Poland, he 
endeavored to arouse the courage of the young 
nobility. country, how much hast thou lost!" 

Charles-Philip was a young man of the greatest 
promise, who had but reached his 21st year. The 
royal family of Sweden, which, a few years before, 
was composed of three members, was now reduced to a 
single one. Gustavus-Adolphus married the beautiful 
Maria-Eleanor of Brandenburg. No royal union was 



24 vGUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

ever concluded with more love, and under happier 
auspices. 

Pietj directed the choice of the monarch. During 
his short stay in Berlin, whither he had repaired to 
ask for the consent of the mother of the princess, he 
did not neglect his religious duties, and went to church 
to implore God's blessing upon his intended union. 

His marriage was celebrated with great pomp, on 
the 28th of November, 1620, in the palace, at Stock- 
holm. But his domestic happiness was clouded', at the 
very moment, when all his wishes seemed about to be 
realized. Maria-Eleanor's first child died, when born, 
an event which changed a day of rejoicing into a day 
of mourning. Gustavus-Adolphus keenly felt this 
visitation, but, in the midst of it, he saw the hand 
of the Heavenly Father, ^the ruler over kings, who 
inflicted this chastisement to teach him submission 
under the severest tests. He wrote to his brother- 
in-law, the Duke of Brandenburg: "I must tell 
you the misfortune that has befallen my house. 
God has punished me, by giving a dead child to my 
wife." His resignation was the same, when, in the 
following year, a similar unfortunate event happened, 
and made him apprehensive of dying without an heir. 
At last, he had a daughter ; and, although he desired a 
son, he took this child in his arms, lavished upon her 
his caresses, and cried : "■ God be blessed! I wish that 
this daughter may be to me as good as a son. May 
God, who has given her, preserve her to me." Then, 
he added, smilingly: '' She will be cunning, for she 
has deceived all of us." He alluded hereby to his and 



1 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 25 

his people's hopes, who considered the birth of a 
prince as certain. He did not surmise that his words 
would once be verified in two respects, and that Gus- 
tavus-Adolphus' daughter would dishonor her name 
by debauchery and apostasy.* What a sad prophecy 
was contained in the king's pleasantry ; and how the 
event shows that faith is not hereditary, but personal ! 
God spared the Christian hero the grief of witnessing 
this double disgrace 



* Christina, Gustavus-Adolphus' daughter, idolized by the 
Swedes, on account of her father, disappointed their hopes, by sur- 
rounding herself with corrupt men, and by squandering the finances 
of the state to satisfy her criminal whims. Tired of her pecuniary 
embarrassments, she abdicated, and later, apostatized, in Belgium. 
She lived for some time in France, where her hands were stained 
with the murder of Monaldeshi, her favorite. She died in Rome. 



CHAPTER III. 




THE THIRTY YEARS' WAR, 

ITS ORIGIN — INTERVENTION OF GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS HIS DL* 

PARTURE. 

T LAST the moment had arrived when G-ustavus- 
-^i^ Adolphus was ^bout to perform the work for 
which Providence had destined him. For a 
long time, he had been longing to shed his blood in de- 
fence of the evangelical Church, which was attacked by 
powerful enemies. The perils and sufferings- of the 
Protestants of Germany stirred up his most lively sym- 
pathy. Their complaints were re-echoed in his heart. 
Involved in three wars after his father's death, he had 
been obliged to postpone his projects, and impatiently 
to regard, as a distant witness, the beginning of the 
Thirty Years' War. 

By the peace of Augsburg the victorious Lutherans 
had extorted from Charles the Fifth the pledge of 
religious liberty ; and the struggle between Catholicism 
and the German Reformation was apparently brought 
to an end. This peace, however, was' but a short 
truce. It is well known, that the Romish Church has 
never admitted any other religious faith, and has always 
considered all those w^ho refuse to accept, without 
reserve, her doctrines and observances as rebels and 

26 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 27 

enemies of divine truth, of which she proclaims herself 
the only and infallible organ. Faithful to these 
principles, the Jesuits scattered throughout the whole 
empire were working to cause a rupture, and were 
calling on the emperor to accelerate by force of arms 
the too slow conversion of the heretics. However, a 
pretext was wanted to justify the renewal of hostilities.* 
Bohemia soon furnished it. This land, the native 
country of John Huss, who had fallen at Constance a 
martyr to that Reformation of which he was a fore- 
runner, had begun by separating from Rome in the 
celebration of the Lord's supper, and had finally em- 
braced Protestantism. The emperor, Rodolph II., was 
obliged to authorize there the freedom of evangelical 
worship. He also gave the Bohemians the right of 
opening new churches and schools, if wanted, and of 
convening their consistories. All those concessions, 
required by a nation which was prepared to obtain 
them by force of arms, were recorded, on July 12th, 
1609, in a celebrated document called Letter of 
Majesty. Matthias, brother and successor of Rodolph, 
not only confirmed, but even increased the religious 
liberties of Bohemia, and gave to this country as king 
the heir of the imperial crown, his nephew, Ferdinand 
of Gratz, Archduke of Styria, who first took'^an oath to 
maintain the franchises stipulated in the Letter of 
3fajesty. But he did not feel himself bound by this 
oath. Being a docile subject of the Holy See and de- 

■^^Schilbr in Ms history of the Thirty Years' War, says: "The 
Jesuits represented it (the peace of Augsburg,) as a measura of 
mere temporary convenience, solemnly repudiated in Rome. 



28 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

voted to the interests of Catholicism, he believed, like 
other Romish princes, that the Pope, according to a 
most disgraceful subterfuge, had power to relieve from 
the most solemn oaths, and anticipated that his perjury 
"would be sanctioned, conformably to the detestable 
maxim: that toioards a heretic neither faith nor honor 
is binding. What could be expected from a prince 
who used to say that he would rather govern a wilder- 
ness than a country peopled with hereticd ? How could 
such a man be otherwise than intolerant ! Reliorious 
perseeutions were unavoidable. The Protestant noble- 
men were deprived of their honors, and even of their 
employments. The officers of the crown, who admin- 
istered the kingdom, were chosen from among the open 
enemies of the creeds, held by the majority of the nation, 
and subjected the Protestants to every kind of moles- 
tation. The general dissatisfaction at last found vent, 
when a new violation of the rights of the Protestants 
was perpetrated. In the Letter of Blajesty the right 
of building, without let or hinder ance, churches and 
school-houses had been conceded to the Protestants. 
The evano-elical conD-reorations of Braunau and Klos- 
tergarb having made use of this right, the church in 
the former place was closed, that in the latter village 
demolished, and the most zealous of the citizens thrown 
into prison. Ferdinand, in contempt of all rights, 
treaties as well as promises, impugned the mainten- 
ance of the formerly conceded religious liberties and 
interdicted their religious meetings. The emperor 
Matthias, being the lord paramount of Bohemia, the 
complaints of his subjects were brought before him, 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 29 

but, instead of righting these wronged congregations, 
he utterly disregarded their grievances, and declared 
that these measures had been taken in accordance 
with his orders. Then the indignation of the Bohemians 
knew no bounds. Not content with forcing upon 
them a detested sovereign, Matthias moreover approved 
all the acts of violence of which they were the victims, 
and openly proclaimed the abolition of their privileges 
and of liberty of conscience. The regency, composed 
of bigoted Catholics, was considered by the people as 
the true author of the imperial answer, and as the 
instigator of the iniquitous orders which had been sent 
from Vienna. A number of armed men, headed by 
the deputies of the Protestant provinces, and followed 
by a mutinous crowd, immediately repaired to the 
palace of Prague, where the counsellors were sitting, 
and summoned the president and his colleagues to 
answer, whether the imperial response had been drawn 
up in their offices and sent from Bohemia to Vienna to 
be returned with the signature of Matthias. Two of 
these high officials spoke calmly and nobly; Slawata 
and Martinitz, the two others, replied with insults and 
threat's. The Protestant deputies, therefore, contented 
themselves with expelling the two former, while the 
two latter, were dragged by the infuriated populace, 
to a window and precipitated from a height of eighty 
feet, into the castle trench. The secretary, their 
accomplice, shared the same fate. This singular mode 
of execution naturally excited the surprise of civilized 
nations. The Bohemians justified it as a national 
custom, and saw nothing remarkable in the whole 

3* 



30 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

affair, excepting that, after such a fall, those upon 
"whom this punishment had been inflicted should have 
been able to rise again safe and sound. The imperial 
commissioners were indebted for this good fortune to 
a dunghill on which thej had fallen, and which, in 
breaking their fall, had saved their lives. This event 
inaugurated the Thirty Years' War, onMay 23d, 1618. 
After such an act of violence, no other resource 
remained to the Bohemians but to arm and defend 
their persons, home and religion. Negotiation was 
impossible, and force alone could restore them their 
rights. With a commendable promptness and energy, 
they established a national government, and informed 
their king Ferdinand, that they felt free from every 
obligation towards a prince who had incessantly con- 
spired against their faith and the laws of his subjects. 
The Jesuits, whom the common hatred accused as the 
instigators of every previous oppression, and as the 
destroyers of the peace of Bohemia, were banished. 
The thirty directors, chosen from among the deputies 
to administer the state affairs, invited all the Protes- 
tants of the kingdom to further the national movement, 
and raised an army, the command of which was 
intrusted to the Count of Thurn, the instigator of the 
revolt, who had forced Rodolph to sign the celebrated 
Letter of Majesty, and who was the principal defender 
of Bohemia's civil and religious liberty. At the same 
time an appeal was addressed to the Hungarians, 
Moravians and Silesians as well as to their brethren of 
the Evangelical Union, a powerful league formed by 
the Protestant Princes of Germany against the Pope 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 31 

and the Emperor, tlieir common enemies. Matthias, 
supplied with gold by Spain, mustered an army to op- 
pose the rebels. But two successive defeats taught 
the Imperialists the difficulty of conquering a nation 
which is fighting for its religion and independence. 

About the same time, and in order to secure these 
first successes, the Evangelical Union sent to the 
assistance of their co-religionists a reinforcement of four 
thousand men, under the command of Count Mans- 
feld. This skillful captain signalized his arrival in 
Bohemia by the capture of Pilsen, the strongest of the 
three towns beloncrinor to the Catholics in that kinojdom. 
This continued success seemed to secure the triumph 
of the Bohemians, and the conquest of their rights. 
A negotiation for peace was entered into with the 
Emperor, at the moment, when he was removed from 
the scene by death and left the imperial crown to the 
exile from Bohemia, the irreconcilable enemy of 
Reformation, Ferdinand of Styria. With the new' 
emperor there was no longer any hope of reconcilia- 
tion. The Count of Thurn resumed his march, which 
he had suspended for a time, and arrived triumphantly 
before Vienna. The Bohemian army, augmented on 
its way by recruits from all the Protestant provinces, 
which Ferdinand had, for a long time, estranged 
through his fanatical violence and injustice, was about 
to dictate orders to the emperor in his very palace, and 
to dispose of the empire at its pleasure. The garrison 
was exhausted. The members of the Estates urged 
Ferdinand, and, by menaces, tried to compel him to 
surrender his capital. The emperor with immovable 



32 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

Urmness refused to comply, and ordered a part of his 
troops to enter the city in order to silence the 
malcontents, and to resist the besiegers, whom the 
intelligence of the successes of the Austrians in 
Bohemia, and the fear of seeing their own capital 
beleaguered, soon forced to retreat. 

In the meantime, the Bohemians, to secure still 
better their deliverance from Ferdinand's rule, chose 
the Elector Palatine, Frederick Y., King, who being 
the leader of the Evangelical Union, could be consid- 
ered the chief of Reformation in Germany. This 
election, greeted by the cheers of the people, took 
place on the 26th of August, 1619. But this reign, 
so auspiciously begun, was of short duration. Fer- 
dinand's policy alienated all the Protestant Princes 
from Frederick Y., who saw himself deprived of the 
support which he had expected, and reduced to the 
Bohemians. . He might, notwithstanding, have con- 
quered, had he not, by many blunders, estranged 
from him a considerable part of his subjects, and had 
not his excessive carelessness, and his indulgence in 
carnal pleasures unfitted him for the high station 
which he occupied in so difficult circumstances. 

His enemies were the more active. Under two 
distinguished generals, Maximilian of Bavaria, and 
Tilly, the armies of the Emperor and of the Catholic 
League marched on Prague. Frederick's troops had 
taken up the most advantageous position on the White 
Mountain near this city, where they were attacked on 
the 8th of November, 1620. In less than an hour the 
king's army, composed of Germans, Hungarians and 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 3 



Q 



Bohemians, and lacking good-will, unity and courage, 
was defeated by the superior numbers of the enemy. 
Frederick was seated at table in Prague, while his 
army was cut to pieces. He availed himself of the 
armistice of eight hours, which the Duke of Bavaria 
granted him, to fly by night from the capital with his 
wife and the chief officers of his army. This flight 
was so hurried, that he left behind him his crown. 

The battle of Prague (White-Mountain) had decided 
the fate of Bohemia. Prague surrendered the next 
day to the victors; the other towns followed the 
example of the capital. The Estates did homage, and 
the same was done by those of Silesia and Moravia. 

The Emperor allowed three months to elapse before 
instituting any inquiry into the past. Reassured by 
this apparent clemency, many who at first had fled in 
terror, appeared again in the capital. All at once, 
however, the storm burst forth; forty-eight of the 
most active among the insurgents were arrested on the 
same day and hour, and tried by an extraordinary 
commission, composed of native Bohemians and Aus- 
trians. Of these, twenty-seven expired on the scaff'old ; 
all died in a manner worthy of the cause they had em- 
braced. ^' Tear this body into a thousand pieces," cried 
the Count Schlick, "ransack my heart, and you will 
find nothing but what we have asseverated in our con- 
fessions ; our love of liberty and religion actuated 
us to take up arms; but God having given victory to 
the Emperor, I say, the Lord's will be done." Many 
of the people also sufi*ered capital punishment. Con- 
fiscation and exile were the chastisements inflicted on 



34 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

^ the other abettors of the insurrection. In order to 
crush the Reformation entirely the most violent mea- 
sures were resorted to. All the Protestant churches 
were closed, the evangelical ministers exiled, and 
30,000 families, unwilling to apostatize from their 
faith, followed them ; soldiers drove inoffensive country 
people into the mass; a Baron of Oppersheim gloried 
in having effected without sermon many more conver- 
sions than the Apostle Peter, who through his sermon 
had converted only 3000 souls. Pinally, in a solemn 
meeting of the Estates, Ferdinand II. himself tore into 
pieces the Letter of Majesty^ and burnt this document 
by which the Emperor Rodolph had guaranteed 
religious liberty to the Bohemians, on the 9th of 
July, 1609. Then, to crown his vengeance, he put 
Frederick, the elect king of Bohemia, under the ban 
of the empire, and deprived him thereby of his titles 
and territories. These he gave to Maximilian of 
Bavaria as a reward for his good services. Thus the 
work for which John Huss had sacrificed his life was, 
for centuries, laid low in this country. 

It was in vain that a few Protestant Princes, 
indignant at a spoliation which threatened their 
crowns, resolved to oppose despotism. Tilly, general 
of the Duke of Bavaria, vanquished them, and Fer- 
dinand's power was henceforth limited only by his 
will. His iron sceptre lay heavy on Protestant Ger- 
many, which was treated as a conquered country. The 
savage gangs of Tilly roved through the provinces, 
plundering and ravaging all, while he sequestered the 
former property of the Bomish clergy, which had 



GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 35 

been secularized by tbe Protestant Princes. This 
standing army, and the numerous acts of injustice from 
the court of Vienna, drove the Protestants to extremi- 
ties. They understood that all these outrages "were 
the sinister prelude of approaching extermination. 
Ferdinand had made a vow, at Loretto and at Rome, 
to his generalissima the. Holy Virgin,, to enforce her 
worship, even at the peril of hi& Kfe, in all countries 
-which might come under his sway. It was not difficult 
to foresee that, encouraged and strengthened by his 
numerous victories, he would soon fulfill his vow. 

In this state of things, weary of the yoke which 
crushed them, exasperated by persecution, solicitous 
for the future, the Estates of Lower- Saxony united in 
a treaty with this intent: to defend themselves against 
unjust aggressions and to repel force by force. Too 
weak to begin the struggle, they turned to the north- 
ern Protestant Princes. Gustavus-Adolphus, although 
detained in Poland, would have come with his large 
and well disciplined army to accept the command of 
the Protestant League, but the King of Denmark, 
Christian IV., brother-in-law of the Elector Palatine, as 
Duke of Holstein and member of the circle of Lower- 
Saxony was preferred to him. 

Jealous of the renown of the King of Sweden, and 
glad of an opportunity to cover himself with no less 
glory. Christian prepared for war and took the field 
in the month of March, 1625, with sixty thousand 
men. But his incapacity compromitted the cause 
which he wished to serve. He experienced several 
losses, and to crown his misfortune, at the very moment, 



36 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

when he was trying to repair his defeat by reinforce- 
ments received from England and Scotland, Ferdinand 
opposed to him a still more formidable adversary than 
Tilly. Wallenstein appeared on the scene to second 
the efforts of the Catholic League and to rank first. 

This nobleman, the richest in Bohemia, was celebra- 
ted for his military genius. He had given proofs of 
his ability and his devotion to the house of Austria in 
several campaigns. Colonel at the battle of Prague, 
(White-Mountain), he had acquired by his gallantry 
and talents the rank of Major-General. Such rapid 
promotion was justified by the expulsion of the Hun- 
garian troops from Moravia, for which brilliant success 
he had been rewarded by a large share of the confisca- 
ted estates of his unfortunate countrymen. Possessed 
of immense property, excited by ambitious views and 
confident in his good fortune, he ofi*ered to raise, 
at his own expense, an army for the Emperor, on con- 
dition that he would be invested with the chief 
command and be no longer subordinate to the League. 
Ferdinand accepted an ofi'er which agreed with his 
dearest wishes. The reputation of the general, the 
prospect of rapid promotion and the hope of plunder 
attracted to his standard adventurers from all quarters 
of Germany. This army, which soon numbered more 
than one hundred thousand men, took the field to fight 
the Protestants, who were always at variance among 
themselves, while concord reigned among their 
adversaries. 

The issue of this contest, now renewed with greater 
animosity, was most unfortunate. Wallenstein, after 



gustaVus-adolphus. 37 

having routed the troops of Mansfeld, the most valua- 
ble auxiliary of the King of Denmark, in a few days 
subdued Silesia, Lower-Saxony and Holstein. Tilly 
defeated Christian IV. in the battle of Lutter, (August, 
1626), and forced this king to restrict himself to the 
defence of his own country, and to abandon his allies 
to the vengeance of their enemies. Everywhere the 
Imperialists made dreadful havoc, and the Protestant 
Princes, who had been unwilling to participate in the 
contest with their brethren, now suffered the well 
deserved chastisement. Trenibling for his kingdom, 
which the emperor publicly promised to Wallenstein, 
Christian availed himself of the check, experienced by 
the imperial general before Stralsund to obtain peace. 
In a conference at Lubeck, on May 22d, 1629, from 
which Wallenstein, with studied contempt, excluded 
the Swedish ambassadors, who came to intercede for 
the Dukes of Mecklenburg, all the conquests taken by 
the Imperialists, were restored to the Danes. The 
conditions imposed upon the king were, that he should 
interfere no farther with the affairs of Grermany than 
was called for by his character of Duke of Holstein, 
and should leave the Dukes of Mecklenburg to their 
fate. Christian, who himself had involved these princes 
in the war with the emperor, now basely sacrificed 
them to gain the favor of the usurper of their terri- 
tories. 

While the Protestants experienced a succession of 
disasters, threatening the very existence of the Refor- 
mation, one example of immovable religious faithfulness 
and heroic constancy is prominent, and deserves to be 
4 



88 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

honorably mentioned. "Wallenstem, wko everywhere 
allowed his wild troops to plunder, rob, and levy con- 
tributions of war, required also the peaceable Duke of 
Pomerania to receive them. The latter unable to re- 
sist, yielded to force, but Stralsund, a Hanse town* 
well fortified both by its location on the sea, its 
strong ramparts and walls, resolutely opposed the de- 
mand. Wallenstein immediately besieged the place. 
Then the brave inhabitants took the solemn oath: to 
abide by the true religion of the Augsburg Confession 
to the end,- — to fight for it, as well as for the rights 
and liberties of their city to the last drop of their 
blood, — to attend in all things only to the welfare of 
the country without fear, selfishness, or a view to sav- 
ing their lives and property, — and to continue to stand 
by the Empire as a member, as long as this line of 
conduct would be justifiable before God, posterity and 
in accordance with the solemn oath taken to defend the 
interests of the city. 

In this oath are embodied genuine evangelical views, 
no haughty arrogance. It contains the expression of 
their immovable resolution to defend their faith, and of 
their sincere loyalty to the country and authority or- 
dained of God. At the request of the inhabitants of 
Stralsund, the Emperor ordered the siege to be raised, 
but Wallenstein arrogantly replied: ''I will take this 
town, though it were fastened by a chain to the 



*The Hanse towns were certain commercial cities in Germany 
■which associated themselves for the protection of commerce. For 
centuries this confederacy commanded the respect and defied the 
power of Kings. It has now ceased to exist. — Webster. 



GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 39 

lieavens.'' But God in heaven scorned such a proud 
boast, and showed that he could defend against all 
the powers of the world even a small troop that relies 
on Him. Wallenstein had sworn that he would not 
spare either age or sex, therefore the inhabitants of 
Stralsund sent their children and women to Sweden, 
exposed themselves day and night to the fire of their 
enemies, and endured all the hardships connected 
with a siege. Here AVallenstein lost twelve thousand 
of his best men, which incensed him to such a degree 
that he swore : ''not to withdraw from the town, should 
he even be flaved alive before its walls." But of what 
avail? His stubbornness was finally obliged to yield 
to the undaunted courage of the citizens of Stralsund. 
This was but a single instance of successful resistance, 
while nearly the whole of Protestant Germany had 
submitted. 

Ferdinand had not waited for Christian's shameful 
defection to inflict the fatal blow on Protestantism. On 
the 6th of March, 1629, he issued the Edict of Resti- 
tutioii, and decided: ''That every secularization of a 
religious foundation by the Protestants, subsequent to 
the date of the religious peace concluded at Augsburg 
in 1555, was contrary to its spirit, and must be 
revoked as a breach of it." He further decided: 
" That, by the religious peace. Catholic sovereigns were 
no further bound to their Protestant subjects than to 
allow them full liberty to quit their territories." In 
obedience to this decision the Protestant States were 
ordered, under pain of the ban of the empire, immedi- 
ately to surrender the secularized religious founda- 



40 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

tions to the imperial commissioners. The edict came 
like a thunderbolt on the whole of Protestant Germany. 
The Protestants were now convinced that the suppres- 
sion of their religion had been resolved on by the 
Emperor. Their remonstrances were unheeded; the 
commissioners were named, and Wallenstein was 
charged to enforce obedience. The edict was first put 
in force in Augsburg, where the peace was concluded. 
The bishop was scarcely reinstated there, when he 
prohibited Protestantism in bis diocese, and had 
gallows erected before the town-hall, which unmistak- 
ably announced what the refractory might expect. 

Impatient of all dependence, Wallenstein everywhere 
levied enormous contributions, and encouraged the 
horrible depredations of the soldiery. The Jesuits 
were triumphant, and stimulated the persecution by 
words expressing, in a cynic language, the implacable 
hatred with which reformation inspired them. 

History has preserved the name of one of these, 
Lorenz Forer, who said to the troops that had come to 
Dilingen with commissioners appointed to take, in the 
name of the Emperor, possession of the Protestant 
property: "Be active, my friends, and if some with- 
stand you, kill and burn them in a fire that shall make 
the stars melt and force the angels of heaven to with- 
draw their feet." 

A continued cry of terror resounded through all 
Germany. The complaints of the Roman Catholics 
were scarcely less numerous than those of the Pro- 
testants. The Emperor's own brother wrote: "Your 
Majesty cannot form any idea of the conduct of the 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 41 

troops. I have myself waged war for a few years, 
and I know that it can seldom be carried on without 
leaving traces of violence. But to break windows, to 
overthrow walls, to commit arson, to cut off noses and 
ears, to torment, to commit rape, to murder for amuse- 
ment's sake, are disorders which field officers can and 
ought to oppose. I know there are people who en- 
deavor to persuade your Majesty that these accusa- 
tions are ungrounded; but I hope that your Majesty 
will place at least as much reliance on me as on such 
gentlemen who fill their purses with the blood and the 
toil of poor people. I could name you many officers 
who, a short time ago, had scarcely the means to 
clothe themselves, and who to-day possess three or four 
hundred thousand florins in specie. Malcontent in- 
creases threateningly, and my conscience does not 
allow me to conceal from your Majesty the true state 
of affairs." 

Thanks to the earnest entreaties of the Duke Maxi- 
milian of Bavaria and of the Catholic princes, "VYallen- 
stein was dismissed, and his dreadful hordes were 
disbanded, though the violent measures against the 
Protestants were not discontinued, and their complaints 
became the subject of derision. This horrible oppres- 
sion lasted a year. 

All the princes of Germany looked in their 

misfortune to the king of Sweden, as seamen look to 

the harbor. The truce, which Gustavus-Adolphus 

concluded with Poland (August 26th, 1629), the very 

year in which the celebrated Edict of Restitution was 

issued, permitted him 'to realize hope?, which, for a 

4* 



42 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

long time, had also been liis own. The misfortunes of 
his German brethren had aiTected him deeply. By 
letters patent of November 11th, 1627, Sweden had 
become the asylum for all the victims of Austrian 
fanaticism.* The Swedes were therefore not aston- 
ished when they saw their king preparing to make 
war on the emperor. 

Gustavus-Adolphus assembled, in November, 1629, 
the senate, at Upsal, and described the increasing mis- 
fortunes of their German brethren and the dangers 
which were threatening Sweden, if she awaited the 
Austrians at home, instead of attacking them first. 
His chancellor and friend, Oxenstiern, disapproved of 
this war, not because he deemed it unjust and un- 
necessary, but, as a fearful and discreet statesman, he 
would not engage his king and his country in a ruin- 
ous and uncertain undertaking. Gustavus disclosed 
to him his plans and hopes, and ended his explanations 
with these words: "What can or cannot be done, God 
alone knows; He alone can change wishes into pro- 
jects, will into execution, and a good beginning into a 
good end." The language in which he addressed the 
senators, who wished to detain him and advised him to 
rest after so many battles, was both so dignified and 
so humble, that no one doubted his obedience to a 
divine impulse. "In eternity alone," said he to them, 
"I shall find rest." 

From this time, Gustavus-Adolphus, encountered no 
more obstacles to his projects. Richelieu, who was 



*The exiled dukes of Mecklenburg found in Sweden a hospita- 
ble reception, and their sons honorable stations 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 43 

then governing France, favored them, and sent to 
liim an embassador, invitinfj him to take the field as 
soon as possible, and assuring him that all Germany 
"would receive him as a Messiah. The Swedish hero 
answered these flatteries "with noble open-heartedness, 
saying that he had received from Germany advices of 
an entirely different character, that the Elector of 
Saxony, although a Protestant, was an ally of the 
emperor, and that Bavaria and the "whole Catholic 
League "would take up arms against him, that he relied 
more on people than on princes, and on God and his 
sword more than on the whole world. Then, animated 
by a praiseworthy feeling of independence, he refused 
the considerable subsidies which were offered to him. 
He wrote to his chancellor: "I did not think it 
proper to become dependent on the King of France." 
It was repugnant to him to associate the sacred cause 
of Reformation with the wily policy of Richelieu, 
whose only aim was to lower the ascendency of the 
House of Austria, because the immense power of the 
emperor roused his fears and wounded his pride. 
Above all he was loth to unite with the cardinal, who 
had taken La Rochelle and vanquished the French 
Protestants. 

With his own resources, Gusta\'Tis-Adolphus did not 
hesitate to fight a sovereign dreaded by all Europe, 
who believed liimselF invincible. He demanded the 
restoration of the old rights of Protestant Germany 
and vouchsafed peace only on that condition. When 
the imperial commissioner heard this bold message, he 
cried: " The King of Sweden would not speak differ- 



44 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

entlj, if he were, with his victorious army, in the 
center of Germany." 

At the same time, Gustavus-Adolphus made with 
the greatest activity the preparations for this expedi- 
tion. When Ferdinand heard this news, he said with 
contempt: ^'We shall have to contend with another 
little enemy." Wallenstein boasted of expelling this 
imprudent aggressor from Germany with a rod,' 
although he offered $30,000 to anyone who would, by 
assassinating the king, save him this trouble. 

Without being intimidated by these insolent brava- 
does, the King of Sweden prosecuted his warlike pre- 
parations, and took those precautionary measures 
which prudence required. Before engaging in so 
distant a war, it was necessary to secure Sweden 
against its neighbors. At a personal interview with 
the King of Denmark, Gustavus assured himself of the 
friendship of that monarch; his frontier, on the side 
of Moscow, was well guarded, and Poland might be held 
in check from Germany, if it betrayed any design of 
infringing the truce. Falkenberg, a Swedish ambassa- 
dor, who visited the courts of Holland and Germany, 
obtained the most flattering promises from several 
Protestant Princes, though none of them yet possessed 
couraoje or self-devotion enoun-h to enter into a formal 
alliance with him. Lubeck and Hamburg engaged to 
advance him money, and to accept Swedish copper in 
return. Emissaries were also dispatched to the Prince 
of Transylvania to excite that implacable enemy of 
Austria to arms. 

In the mean time, Swedish levies were made in Ger- 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 45 

many and tke Netherlands, the regiments increased to 
their full complement, new ones raised, ships provided, 
a fleet fitted out, provisions, military stores and 
money collected. Thirty men-of-war were in a short 
time prepared, fifteen thousand men equipped, and two 
hundred transports were ready to convey them across 
the Baltic. However small this army, it was admira- 
ble in all points of discipline, courage and experience, 
and might serve as a nucleus of a more powerful 
armament. Oxenstiern was posted with ten thousand 
men in Prussia, to protect that province against 
Poland. Some regular troops and a considerable body 
of militia, which served as a nursery for the main body 
of .the army, remained in Sweden, as a defense against 
a sudden invasion by any treacherous neighbor. 

These were the measures taken for the external de- 
fense of the kingdom. Its internal administration was 
provided for with equal care. The government was 
intrusted to the Council of State, while the queen, 
tenderly as he was attached to her, was excluded from 
all share in the government, for which her limited 
talents incapacitated her. H"e set his house in order 
like a dying man. On the 20th of May, 1630, when 
all his measures were arranged, and all was ready for 
his departure, the king appeared in the Diet at Stock- 
holm, to bid the Estates* a solemn farewell. Taking 



* The law-making power is vested in the four Estates, (Nobility, 
Clergy, Burghers, and Peasants), into which the Swedes are 
divided. Each Estate has a house and a separate and equal vote. 
The concurrence of at least three houses is required to make a 
law. Various attempts have been made to change this representa- 
tion, but the Nobles and the Clergy have always defeated 
, them. — Neiv American Cyclopedia, Art., Sioeden^ Vol. JTF. 



46 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

in his arms his daughter Christina, then only four 
years old, he presented her to the Estates as the future 
Sovereign, exacted from them a renewal of the oath of 
allegiance to her, in case he should never more return, 
and then read the ordinances for the government of 
the kingdom during his absence, or the minority of his 
daughter. The whole assembly was dissolved in tears, 
and the king himself was some time, before he could 
attain sufficient composure to deliver his farewell ad- 
dress. 

^'Not lightly nor wantonly," said he, ^'am I about 
to involve myself and you in this new and dangerous 
■war ; God is my witness that I do not fight to gratify 
my own ambition. But the Emperor has wronged me 
most grievously in the persons of my ambassadors, he 
has supported my enemies, persecutes my friends and 
brethren, tramples my religion, in the dust — and even 
stretches his arm against my crown. The oppressed 
States of Germany call loudly for aid, which, by God's 
help, vre will give them." 

" I am fully sensible of the dangers to which my life 
will be exposed. I have never yet shrunk from them, 
nor IS it likely that I shall escape them all. Hitherto 
Providence has wonderfully protected me; but I shall 
at last fall in defense of my country. I commend you 
and all my subjects, to the protection of Heaven, and 
hope that we shall meet in eternity. 

"To you, my Counsellors of State, I address myself 
first. May God enlighten you, and fill you with 
wisdom to promote the w^elfare of my people. You 
too, my brave Noblemen, I commend to the divine pro- 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 47 

tectlon ; continue to prove yourselves the worthy succes- 
sors of those heroic Goths whose bravery humbled to 
the (lust the pride of ancient Rome. To you, Minis- 
ters of religion, I recommend peaceableness and piety ; 
be yourselves examples of the virtues which you 
preach, and abuse not your influence over the minds of 
my people. On you, deputies of the Burgesses and 
the Peasantry, I entreat the blessing of Heaven ; may 
your industry be rewarded by a prosperous harvest ; 
your stores 25lenteously filled, and may you be crowned 
abundantly with all the blessings of this life. For 
the prosperity of all my subjects, absent and present, 
I offer my warmest prayers to Heaven. I bid you all 
a sincere — it may be an eternal farewell." 

Here the whole assembly burst into tears, and the 
king himself could not forbear weeping. 

However, after a silence of a few minutes, he pro- 
nounced with a loud voice the words of the Psalm xc, 
which he used to repeat before beginning any under- 
taking : 

Oh, satisfy us early with Thy mercy; that we may 
rejoice and be glad all our days. — Make us glad ac- 
cording to the days wherein Thou hast afilicted us, and 
the years wherein we have seen evil. — Let Thy work 
appear unto Thy servants, and Thy glory unto their 
children. — And let the beauty of the Lord our God be 
upon us: and establish Thou the work of our hands 
upon us ; yea, the work of our hands, establish Thou it. 

He set apart the first Friday of the months of July, 
August, and September as days of humiliation, fasting, 
and prayer, to call God's blessing on his undertaking, 



48 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

and embarked with his little army nine or ten days 
afterwards, at the beginning of June, in Elfsnabbe, 
followed by the regrets and good wishes of an immense 
concourse, which had flocked thither to cheer his de- 
parture. 



CHAPTER IV. 



' GUSTAVUS-ADOLPRUS AY GFEMAXY. 

HIS DIFFICULTIES — SIEGE OF MAGDEBUKG — BATTLE OF LEIPZIG. 

tSSAILED by contrary -vrinds, the Swedish fleet 
^^__^^ ' was soon obliged to seek a shelter in a harbor, 
"^ near the roadstead which it had just left. "When 
it again put to sea, the weather was not more favorable, 
and the passage was so protracted that the troops were 
short of provisions. This double trial, at the very be- 
ginning of the expedition, would have disturbed a man 
less steadfast than the king of Sweden, and induced him 
to return. But Gustavus Adolphus, certain that the 
Lord had acknowledo-ed his undertakina:, far from see- 
ing bad omens in these obstacles, looked upon them 
merely as heavenly visitations. He was, therefore, not 
an instant discouracjed, and immediately sent for a new 
supply of provisions. At last he reached, during a 
violent storm, the island of Kugen in Pomerania, then 
possessed by Austria. He landed his troops on the 
islands of Wollin and Usedom. Stepping on shore, he 
fell on his knees, and, in the presence of his retinue, 
he thanked God in these words: "0 Thou who rulest 
over the heavens and the earth, over the wind and sea, 
Lord! how can I worthily thank Thee for the miracu- 
lous protection which Thou hast so graciously vouch- 
5 49 



50 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 

safed to me during this dangerous passage ! My heart 
is full of gratitude for all Thy benefits. Oh ! deign 
to bless this enterprise undertaken for the defence of 
Thy distressed church, and the consolation of Thy 
faithful servants. Let it redound not to my glory, but 
to Thine. O Grod, who triest the hearts and the reins, 
Thou knowest the purity of my intentions ! Grant me 
favorable weather and a good wind, which will cheer 
my brave army and allow me to continue Thy sacred 
work. Amen !" 

A war waged with such feelings and for so noble 
an end, was indeed a holy work. The general, who 
sanctified every action of his life by prayer, and lived 
in an uninterrupted communion with God, was not an 
ambitious man, .eager for conquests and fame. Such 
a fervor is very rarely found, especially among leaders 
of armies, who, generally, are more confident in their 
own resources than in the help from above. But Gus- 
tavus-Adolphus relied on God's assistance; and con- 
sequently he marched without money and with but a 
handful of soldiers against the troops of a great 
Empire. 

It was on the 24th of June, 1630, that the landing 
of the Swedes took place. A century before, on the 
same day of the very same month, the Protestants had 
made in Augsburg, in the presence of the Emperor 
Charles Y., the princes, dukes, and bishops of all Ger- 
many, that celebrated Confession which served them 
as a standard and as a rallying point. It was 
in the moment when the principles, then proclaimed, 
were endangered, that Gustavus-Adolphus hastened to 



GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 51 

defend tliem. This seemingly fortuitous, but provi- 
dential coincidence must undoubtedly bave struck bis 
mind wben be thanked God for his preservation from 
the fury of the waves. The reminiscences of such an 
anniversary, by recalling to bis memory a glorious 
past, must have inflamed his zeal, and inspired him 
"with confidence for the future. The undaunted courage, 
the immovable energy, the firm faith and the deep piety 
of Luther and Melanchthon, those, great reformers and 
authors of the Augsburg Confession, were revived in 
the heart of the Swedish hero and enlivened his 
prayers so powerfully that his soldiers were moved 
to tears. ''Do not weep," said he to them, "but pray 
without ceasing. The more you pray, the more 
victories will be ours. Incessant prayer is half a 
victory." 

After having called the blessing of God on himself 
and his soldiers, Gustavus-Adolphus took up the spade, 
and his whole army, following his example, began to 
throw up intrenchments to fortify the camp against the 
enemies, who were very numerous in the neighborhood. 
When these works were finished, the kin or said to his 
soldiers: "Do not believe that I undertake this war 
for myself or my kiagdom. "We march to the relief of 
our oppressed brethren. You will, by brilliant victories, 
accomplish this generous project and acquire an 
immortal glory. Be not afraid of the enemies whom 
we are going to meet; they are the same whom you 
have already defeated in Prussia. Your gallantry has 
just forced Poland to conclude a truce of six years. If 
you show the same courage and the same perseverance, 



52 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

you will procure for the Evangelical Church and for 
our German brethren the security and peace which 
they need." This address was followed by a pro- 
clamation of military laws and regulations, according 
to which any outrage on persons or property was 
punished with death. However necessary a strict 
discipline may be to the maintenance of order in the 
army, Gustavus was not content with it; but, fully 
convinced that all such ordinances must remain ineffec- 
tual, as long as the soldiers are not actuated by higher 
motives, and above all by the fear of God, he made it 
the duty of the chaplains to preach the gospel faithfully 
in the camp, and besides, established prayer-meetings, 
which were held twice every day. 

Without loss of time, Gustavus- Adolphus siibdued 
the shore on which he had made this descent, and, 
after having taken possession of the island of Rugen, 
he expelled the imperial troops from the neighboring 
islands, and thus secured easy communications with 
Sweden. Then, he rapidly advanced on Stettin, the 
capital of Pomerania, resolved to put an end to the 
hesitations of the old Buke Bogislaus XIV., who feared 
to choose between the alliance of Sweden or the 
despotism of Austria. Encamped before this city, 
which Gustavus had summoned to receive a Swedish 
garj-ison, he was, while waiting for Bogislaus' answer, 
visited by citizens, who were anxious to see the man that 
called himself the defender of the Protestant cause, to 
which they were themselves devoted. The king received 
them with the utmost kindness. He conversed with 
them about their common faith, the misfortunes of their 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 53 

German brethren and the plans which he had made for 
their deliverance, and which, with the help of God, he 
hoped to carry into effect. They were no less touched 
by his affability than convinced by his eloquence. 
Even his pleasing exterior and his majestic stature 
contributed to win hearts and rouse enthusiasm. His 
countenance was pale and long, but regular and ex- 
pressive. His hair was light, his beard beautiful, his 
look piercing. Like his ancestor Gustavus Yasa, he 
was tall, nimble, well formed and gentlemanlike in his 
deportment. He liked music and played the lute very 
well. His brilliant military achievements, united to so 
many accomplishments, soon rendered him popular. 
Finally, Bogislaus, after a conference with the king, 
was prevailed upon to enter into a close alliance with 
his new protector. By this league with Pomerania, 
Gustavus secured a powerful friend in Germany, who 
covered his rear, and maintained his communication 
with Sweden. The gates of Stettin were opened to thft 
Swedes, but in order not to be a burden to the inhabi- 
tants, Gustavus-Adolphus made his soldiers encarap 
in their tents. 

Afterwards the Swedish army left this city to con- 
quer the remainder of Pomerania. The efforts of the 
general Torquato-Conti, who corumanded the imperial 
troops stationed in this Duchy, could not prevent the 
progress of the Swedes. He was obliged to retreat, 
but, in doing so, his soldiers wreaked a dreadful ven- 
geance upon the innocent inhabitants. They vented 
their wrath by perpetrating outrages and the most 
shocking acts of cruelty, not only on inoffensive citizens, 

5* 



54 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. ' 

uut also on feeble women and innocent cliildren. It 
is not surprising therefore, that the Swedes were hailed 
ns saviours, and that their pious king was considered as 
an angel sent by God to relieve the oppressed. But 
Protestant princes, far from sharing these views and 
favoring his undertaking, were animated with hostile 
feelings towards him and inclined to impede his 
progress. 

Appalled by the successes of Gustavus-Adolohus, 
his enemies did not shrink from resorting to every 
means, however criminal, to rid themselves of their 
unconquerable adversary, and once they almost suc- 
ceeded. The king of Sweden, with a view to an 
attack, was, with seventy horsemen, reconnoitering the. 
accesses to the Austrian camp. Suddenly he was sur- 
prised by five hundred hostile cuirassiers. His dra- 
goons displayed wonderful bravery ; their efibrts were 
of no avail. They were crushed by the overwhelming 
number. The king's horse was killed under him. He 
saw his faithful servants fall. He was surrounded on 
all sides, and was about to be taken prisoner, when two 
hundred Finlanders, who were awaiting his return, 
informed of his danger by the discharge of musketry, 
rushed with lightning speed on the assailants, scattered 
them and once more saved their king. An Italian, 
named Quinti del Ponto, who had left the emperor's 
standard to pass into the Swedish camp, was suspected 
to have caused the king to fall into this ambush, by 
apprizing the Austrians of the intention of Gustavus, 
and of the smallness of his escort. The following day, 
this wicked wretch, who had ingratiated himself to 



&USTAVUS-AD0LPHU9. " " 55 

such a degree as to be appointed an officer, disappear- 
ed and was heard of no more. Another Italian 
deserter, his friend, being arrested, denounced him and 
even confessed to being his accomplice. When he was 
examined, before his condemnation, he said to his 
judges : "It was often my intention to kill the king; 
but my heart always checked me; and whenever I 
seized the murderous weapon, my hand seemed para- 
lyzed." What a man he must have been, who inspired 
his fiercest enemies with respect and affection ! 

He never troubled himself about these cowardly 
plots. Mistrust had no access to this loyal soul, and 
fior a long time he liked to repeat David's words: "In 
God I put my trust : I will not be afraid what man 
can do unto me." Ps. Ivi: 11. Nothing could dampen 
his courage, nor disturb his cheerfulness, nor did he 
neglect to follow up his successes. He continued his 
progress in Pomerania, and saw his army daily in- 
creasing. The troops which had fought under Mans- 
feld, Duke Christian of Brunswick, the King of Den- 
mark and Wallenstein, came in crowds, both officers 
and soldiers, to join his victorious standard. The Es- 
tates, glad to see the country freed from Torquato- 
Conti's insatiable avarice, and from'the excesses of the 
imperial troops, unanimously voted the king a contri- 
bution of one hundred thousand florins. The modera- 
tion and humanity of the Swedes, won for them the 
hearts of the people, who every where received them 
with joy. Soon Gustavus-Adolphus 'forced the Impe- 
rialists to evacuate the Duchy, and, at the end of 1630, 
but a few months after his departure from Sweden, he 



56 GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

there commanded as sovereign. Notwithstanding his 
desire to penetrate into Mecklenburg, he was obliged 
to restrict himself to surrounding it, and waiting for 
the end of winter. 

The Emperor, after having, with his courtiers, de- 
rided Gustavus-Adolphus, who was called in Vienna 
the Snow-King, whom the cold of the North kept to- 
gether, but who would infallibly melt away as he 
.advanced southward, soon saw that the Swedes were 
inured to all seasons, and brave soldiers not to be 
trifled with. He gathered an army which he intrusted 
to a companion in arms- of Wallenstein, the General 
Pappenheim, equally experienced and intrepid. On the 
other hand, the Catholic League, alarmed by the rapid 
successes of this most terrible champion of Protestant- 
ism, had levied troops, and put at their head the Lieu- 
tenant of Maximilian of Bavaria, the conqueror of 
Mansfeld and of the King of Denmark, General Tilly, 
who as yet had never lost a battle. Since Wallenstein 
had incurred the Emperor's displeasure, there was no 
lack of mercenary soldiers, who indiscriminately served 
all parties, according to the advantages offered them. 
Had Gustavus-Adolphus been rich, it would have been 
easy for him to take most of them into his pay, and 
thus increase . his troops, which were not numerous 
enough to battle with two armies at the same time. 
He was reduced to maintain his position in Pomerania,, 
and to procure, before advancing, a supply of soldiers 
and money. Abetter which, in December,, IG'SO^ he: 
addressed to his faithful Chancellor Oxensijiern, shows, 
his painful situation and his inalterable confidence iu 



GTJSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 57 

God: "May God," said he, ''into whose hands I com- 
mit all, help us to live through the winter. Then, 
thanks to your care and foresight, the summer will 
be more prosperous. I would like to describe our 
position to you, but a sabre-cut having rendered my 
hand stiff, I am prevented from doing so. Let it suf- 
fice, you to know that the enemy enjoys every advan- 
tage for establishing his winter-quarters, since all 
Germany has become his prey. If I had more soldiers 
with me on the banks of the Oder, I would march for- 
ward. Although our cause is good and just, the issue 
is uncertain — uncertain are also man's days. There- 
fore I pray you, for Christ's sake, be not discouraged, 
if all does not succeed to our wishes. I most earnestly 
recommend my family to your care, if a misfortune 
should befall me. It is in many respects worthy of 
interest. The mother needs advice ; the daughter, a 
tender child, will be exposed to many difficulties, if she 
should reign, and to many dangers, if others should 
teign over her. I commit both of them, their future, 
my life and all that I possess in this world, to God's 
holy and powerful keeping. I am persuaded that 
whatever may befall me on this earth, will always be 
for my good, and, after this life, I hope to enjoy eter- 
nal peace and joy." 

By suspending the course of his victories, Gustavus- 
Adolphus did not, however, remain inactive. He 
completed the conquest of Pomerania, where two or 
three strongholds had refused to surrender, and ad- 
vanced into the Duchy of Brandenburg, the key of Meck- 
lenburg. He defeated the Imperial troops wherever 



58 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

lie encountered them, and maintained his position so 
well, that Tilly, who had come to the attack, retired 
and fell back to the Elbe, without venturing to defend 
Frankfort-on-the-Oder, which the Swedes took by as- 
sault towards the middle of winter, after a siege of 
three, days. 

Notwithstanding the victories which he won, and 
the divine protection which he enjoyed, no evangeli- 
cal prince dared league with him, except the Landgrave 
William Y. of Hesse Cassel (October, 1630), who was 
his first and most faithful ally. Even the enforcement of 
the Edict of Restitution, and the steps openly taken by 
the Emperor against the Lutheran Church, did not in- 
duce the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburg to con- 
federate with him. Gustavus-Adolphus deeply grieved 
by this distrust, and satisfied that he could not expect 
the cooperation of all the Protestant Princes of Ger- 
many, who dreaded his influence upon their subjects, 
and saw in him rather a rival than a friend, resolved 
to accept the alliance of France. The treaty with 
this Power was signed on the 13th of January, 1631, 
at Bgerwaldcj in the Duchy of Brandenburg. The 
contracting parties mutually covenanted to defend 
each other with a military force, to protect their com- 
mon friends, to restore to their dominions the deposed 
Princes of the Empire, and to replace every thing on 
the same footing on which it stood before the rebel- 
lion of Bohemia and the Edict of Restitution. For 
this end, Sweden engaged to maintain an army of 
forty-six thousand men in Germany, and France agreed- 
to furnish the Swedes, during five years, .with an an- 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 59 

nual subsidy of four hundred thousand dollars, thus 
hoping to set bounds to Austria's ever increasing 
ambition, and to destroy its preponderance in Europe, 

As soon as the Protestant States of the Empire, 
convened by John-George, Elector of Saxony, had 
assembled in Leipzig, on the 6th of February, 1631, 
to assert their rights and oppose the oppressive course 
pursued by the Emperor, the King of Sweden apprised 
the members of the Confederacy of the treaty con- 
cluded with France, inviting them to a closer union 
with himself. The application was seconded by France, 
who spared no pains to win over the Elector of 
Saxony. Gustavus was willing to be content with 
secret support, if the Princes should deem it too bold 
a step, as yet, to declare openly in his favor. Several 
Princes gave him hopes of his proposals being accepted 
on the fii'st favorable opportunity; but the Saxon 
Elector, full of jealousy and distrust toward the Kiug 
of Sweden, and true to the selfish policy he had pur- 
sued, could not be prevailed upon to give a decisive 
answer, and finally the Conventiorf declined to enter 
into any alliance with Gustavus-Adolphus. The Duke 
Bernard of Weimar, and his brother, convinced that 
the interests of Protestantism in Germany required a 
league of all the Protestant Princes, under the leadership 
of the King of Sweden, withdrew from the Council, 
indignant at this decision. 

In the mean time, Tilly had gone to besiege Magde- 
burg, which had embraced the cause of the King. 
When Gustavus was apprised, on the 16th of April, of 
the danger of this city, he resolved immediately to 



GO GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

marcli to its relief; and moved, "vyith all his cavalry, 
and ten regiments of infantry, towards the Spree. In 
order to secure his rear, he demanded that the Elector 
of Brandenburg, his hrother-in-law, should allow him 
to hold the fortresses of Kllstrin and Spandau, till 
the siege of Magdeburg would be raised. But this 
Prince, afraid -that, by such a step, he must at once 
break with the Emperor, and expose his states to the 
vengeance of this monarch, was not willing to grant 
this demand. "When the King witnessed his timorous 
hesitation, he could not restrain his indignation: " My 
road is to Magdeburg," said he; ^'not for my own 
advantage, but for that of the Protestant religion. If 
no one will stand by me, I shall immediately retreat, 
conclude a peace with the Emperor, and return to 
Stockholm. I am convinced that Ferdinand will rea- 
dily grant me whatever conditions I may require. 
But if Magdeburg is once lost, and the Emperor re- 
lieved from all fear of me, then it is for you to look 
for yourselves and the consequences." This timely 
threat, and perhaps, too, the aspect of the Swedish 
army, which was strong enough to obtain by force, 
what was refused to entreaty, brought at last the Elec- - 
tor to his senses, and Spandau was delivered into the 
hands of the Swedes. Then John-George, Elector of 
Saxony, controlled by selfish considerations and jeal- 
ousy, would not listen to the arguments which Gustavus 
advanced in the name of German liberties, of religion 
and of humanity, and refused to allow him a free pas- 
saore throus^h his states. The Kino; of Sweden hesi- 
tated to employ force against a Protestant Prince who, 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 61 

in Leipzig, had proyoked the formation of a Protes- 
tant League, and demanded the revocation of the Edict 
of Restitution. While he was still soliciting, Magde- 
burg, after a heroic resistance, succumbed. May 20th, 
to the efforts of Tilly's numerous soldiers, who were 
reinforced by Pappenheim's troops, and assisted by 
traitors. The King of Sweden had done for this city 
all that was in his power. He had sent to the Mag- 
deburgers Dietrich of Falkenberg, an experienced of- 
ficer, who succeeded in passing the enemy's outposts, 
and in reaching the city only by disguising himself as 
a boatm.an. This general was appointed by the magis- 
trates governor of the town, during the war,, and 
had to direct the military operations. He found one 
part of the inhabitants quite discouraged and inclined 
to yield. He revived their spirits, so that, with a gar- 
rison reduced to 2000 infantry, 150 horsemen and 
3000- raw recruits, it was resolved to resist Tilly's 
army, which numbered 33,000 infantry and 9000 
cavalry. However, when the outworks of the city had 
been carried by Tilly, the magistrates determined to 
capitulate. But religious zeal, an ardent love of 
liberty, an invincible hatred of the Austrian yoke, 
and the expectation of speedy relief, banished, as yet, 
the idea of a surrender ; and, divided as they were in 
every thing else, they were united in the resolve to 
defend themselves to the last extremity. 

Their hopes of succor were apparently well founded. 
They knew that the Confederacy of Leipzig was arm- 
ing, and were aware of the near approach of Gusta- 
vus-Adolphus. Both were alike interested in the 
6 



62 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

preservation *of Magdeburg; and a few days might 
bring the King of Sweden before its walls. All this 
was also known to Tilly, who, therefore, was anxious 
to make himself speedily master of the place. On the 
9th of May, the fire of the Imperialists was suddenly 
stopped, and the cannon withdrawn from several of 
the batteries. The besieged were convinced that deli- 
verance was at hand. Both citizens and soldiers left 
their posts on the ramparts early in the morning, to 
indulge themselves after their long toils, with the re- 
freshment of sleep, when Pappenheim forced his way 
into the city. Falkenberg, roused by the report of 
musketry, hurried to the scene of action with all the 
force he could hastily assemble, but his resistance was 
of no avail, he fell in the commencement of the action. 
The roaring of musketry, the pealing of the alarm 
bells, and the growing tumult, apprised the awakening 
citizens of their danger. Hastily arming themselves, 
they rushed in blind confusion against the enemy. 
The governor being killed, their efforts were without 
plan and cooperation, and at last their ammunition 
began to fail. Before noon, all the works were car- 
ried, and the town was in the enemy's hands. 

The city, the richest in Germany, was plundered 
and drenched with the blood of its inhabitants. The 
scenes of slaughter and barbarity of which it was the 
theatre, have acquired a melancholy celebrity in his- 
tory. Neither innocent childhood, nor helpless old 
age; neither youth, sex, rank, nor beauty, could dis- 
arm the fury of the conquerors. Wives were abused 
in the arms of their husbands, daughters at the feet of 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 63 

• 

their parents. No place, however obscure, or however 
sacred, escaped the rapacity of the enemy. In a sin- 
gle church, fifty-three women were found beheaded. 
The Croats amused themselves with throwing children 
into the flames, Pappenheim's Walloons with stabbing 
infants at the mother's breast. Some officers of the 
Catholic League, horror-struck at this dreadful scene, 
ventured to remind Tilly that he might stop the car- 
nage. ''Return in an , hour," was his answer. "I 
will see what I can do; the soldier must have some 
reward for his danger and toils." These horrors lasted 
with unabated fury, till at last the smoke and flames 
proved a check to the plunderers. To augment the 
confusion, and to divert the resistance of the inhabi- 
tants, the Imperialists had, in the commeijcement of 
the assault, fired the city in several places. The wind, 
rising rapidly, spread the flames, till tlie blaze became 
universal. Fearful, indeed, was the tumult, amid 
clouds of smoke, heaps of dead bodies, the clash of 
swords, the crash of falling ruins, and streams of blood. 
The atmosphere glowed ; and the intolerable heat 
forced at last even the murderers to take refuGje in 
their camp. In less than twelve hours, this strong, 
populous and flourishing city, one of the finest in Ger- 
many, was reduced to ashes, with the exception of two 
churches and a few houses. 

Scarcely had the fury of the flames abated, when 
the Imperialists returned to renew the pillage, amid 
the ruins and ashes of the town. Many were sufl'o- 
cated by the smoke ; many found rich booty in the 
cellars, where the citizens had concealed their more 



G4 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 

valuable effects. On the 13th of May, Tilly himself 
appeared in the town, after the streets had been cleared 
of ashes and dead bodies. Horrible and revolting to 
humanity was the scene that presented itself. The 
living, crawling from under the dead, children wan- 
dering about with heart-rending cries, calling for their 
parents ; and infants still sucking the breasts of their 
lifeless mothers. More than six thousand bodies were 
thrown into the Elbe to clear the streets ; a much 
greater number had been consumed by the flames. 
The whole number of the slain was reckoned at not less 
than thirty thousand. — In his report, which Tilly sent 
to Vienna, he said, that since the destruction of Troy 
and Jerusalem, nothing similar had occurred. 

This dreadful catastrophe struck all the Protestants 
of Germany with horror. The Jesuits, always crafty 
to avail themselves of circumstances, accused Gustavus- 
Adolphus, in order to make him odious, of having 
abandoned Magdeburg, and sacrificed an important 
and devoted city, to carry into effect some plan of 
campaign. By these insidious rumors, they hoped to 
deprive the King of Sweden of the confidence and 
esteem of his German brethren. It was not difficult 
for him to prove the untruth of these accusations, and 
to justify himself. The destruction of Magdeburg 
must be chiefly imputed to the prejudices and the mis- 
trust of the Electors of Brandenburg and Saxony. 

The innocence of Gustavus-Adolphus is established 
in the letter which he addressed to the Elector of 
Saxony, when Magdeburg was threatened. He wrote : 
*'I see myself obliged to lower my pretensions, and 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIITJS. - 65 

not to advance further. To post myself between two 
wavering powers, or to abandon the rivers by which 
all my convoys arrive, would be contrary to all the 
rules of military science. However, I wish to show 
Magdeburg, how much solicitude I feel for her, and, 
should I sacrifice my person, I will do all that I can 
to deliver her. May God sustain me by Tlis grace, 
and make my perseverance triumphant. Before God 
and before men, I declare that I am innocent of all 
the blood that will be shed, and of all the misfortunes 
that will happen. Those are responsible, who in a 
Christian cause, did not scruple to abandon me most 
unexpectedly." 

The terror which the ruin of Magdeburg first caused, 
soon changed into a legitimate indignation. Injurious 
as the immediate consequences of the fall of the city 
were to the Protestant cause, its remoter eifects were 
more advantageous. Exasperated by the renewed 
rigors of the Emperor, who became more and more 
exacting and cruel, the Protestant Princes saw no 
other means to escape their unfortunate fate, than to 
throw themselves into the arms of Gustavus-Adolphus. 
Several of them made an alliance with him, except 
the Elector George- William of Brandenburg, who de- 
manded the restitution of the fortress of Spandau, and 
was obstinately bent upon a neutrality, which was too 
favorable to the interests of Austria to be longer tole- 
rated. The King of Sv/cden, after having exhausted 
all means of conciliation, declared to his brother-in-law 
that he was willing to evacuate Spandau, but hence- 
forth would regard him as an enemy. 
6* 



GQ GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

To give weight to this declaration, he appeared with 
his whole force before Berlin. ''I will not be treated 
worse than the Imperial Generals," was his reply to 
the Ambassadors, whom the bewildered Elector dis- 
patched to his camp. ''Your master has received 
them into his territories, furnished them with all 
necessary supplies, ceded to them every place which 
they required, and yet, by all these concessions, he 
could not prevail upon them to treat his subjects with 
common humanity. All that I require of him is secu- 
rity, a moderate sum of money, and provisions for my 
troops; in return, I promise to protect his country, 
and to keep the war at a distance from him. On these 
points, however, I must insist; and my brother, the 
Elector, must instantly determine to have me as a 
friend, or to see his capital plundered." 

This decisive tone brought about a good effect, and 
the cannon pointed against the town put an end to 
the doubts of George- William. In a few days, a treaty 
was signed, by which the Elector engaged to furnish a 
monthly subsidy of thirty thousand dollars, to leave 
Spandau in the King's hands, and to open CUstrin at 
all times to the Swedish troops. The King's satisfac- 
tion on this favorable event, was increased by the 
agreeable intelligence that Greifswald, the only for- 
tress which the Imperialists still held in Pomerania, 
had surrendered. He appeared once more in the 
Duchy, and was gratified at the sight of the general 
joy which he had caused to the people. A year had 
elapsed since Gustavus first entered Germany, and 
this event was now celebrated by all Pomerania as a 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 67 

:Sational festival. Shortly before, the Czar of Moscow 
had sent ambassadors to congratulate him, to renew 
his alliance, and even to offer him troops. He had 
great reason to rejoice at the friendly disposition of 
Russia, as it was indispensable to his interests that 
Sweden itself should remain undisturbed by any dan- 
gerous neighbor during the war in which he himself 
was engao'ed. 

Among the Princes of the Leipzig Confederation, 
the Elector of Saxony and the Landgrave of Hesse, 
were the most powerful; and until they were disarmed, 
the universal authority of the Emperor was uncon- 
firmed. Against the Landgrave, therefore, Tilly first 
directed his attack, and marched straight from Mag- 
deburg into Thuringia. During this march, the ter- 
ritories through which he passed were laid waste and 
plundered. The troops seemed governed entirely by 
their thirst of gold and sensual enjoyments. Nothing 
could still their brutal passions, their eager covetous- 
ness. Summoned by Tilly to disband his army, to 
receive Imperial garrisons in his fortresses, and to pay 
the necessary contributions, the Landgrave of Hesse- 
Cassel refused to comply with these demands. The 
irruption of two bodies of Imperial troops was the im- 
mediate result of his refusal ; but the Landgrave gave 
them so warm a reception, that they could effect no- 
thing; and just as Tilly was preparing to follow with 
his whole army, to punish the unfortunate country for 
the firmness of its sovereign, the movements of the 
King of Sweden recalled him to another quarter. 

During Tilly's expedition into Thuringia, Pappen- 



68 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

heim commanded in Magdeburg, but was unable to 
prevent the Swedes from crossing the Elbe, routing 
some Imperial detachments, and seizing several posts. 
Alarmed at the approach of the King of Sweden, he 
anxiously recalled Tilly, who encamped on the same 
side of the river as Gustavus. The Swedes routed 
three of his regiments, carried off half their baggage, 
and burned the remainder. Tilly in vain advanced 
within cannon-shot of the King's camp, and offered 
him battle. Gustavus, weaker by one-half than his 
adversary, prudently declined it. His position being 
too strong for an attack; nothing more ensued but 
a few skirmishes, in which the Swedes had invariably 
the advantage. Fortune seemed to have forsaken 
Tilly, since the carnage of Magdeburg. 

The King of Sweden, on the contrary, was followed 
by uninterrupted success. While he himself was 
encamped in Werben, on the banks of the Elbe, the 
whole of Mecklenburg, with the exception of a few 
towns, was conquered by his General Tott; and he 
enjoyed the satisfaction of reinstating both Dukes in 
their dominions. He proceeded in person to Gustrow, 
where the reinstatement was solemnly to take place, 
to give additional dignity to the ceremony by his pre- 
sence. < The two Dukes, with their deliverer between 
them, and attended by a splendid train of Princes, 
made a public entry into the city, which the joy of 
their subjects converted into an affecting solemnity. 
Soon after his return to Werben, the Landgrave of 
Hesse-Cassel appeared in his camp, to conclude an offen- 
sive and defensive alliance; he was the first sovereign 




We contend not for earthly possessions : but for the Word, and the 

glory of God. — (p. 69.) 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 69 

Prince in Germany who voluntarily and openly declared 
against the Emperor. 

Tilly, after having wasted his time and forces before 
the Swedish camp, retreated and bent his course to- 
wards the states of the Elector of Saxony, whose in- 
tentions Austria dreaded, and whose levies of troops 
she disapproved. Saxony was for the Imperialists a 
rich lure. Hitherto this country had been spared in 
consequence of the attachment of its Prince to th-e 
House of Austria, and of Ferdinand's desire to retain 
him in his party. Tilly and his band pounced upon 
the Saxons with the greediness of birds of prey. 

The Elector, rendered desperate by the entrance of 
Tilly into his territories, and by the devastations which 
this general committed, threw himself under the pro- 
tection of Sweden. 

He dispatched his Field-Marshal, Arnheim, in all 
haste to the camp of Gustavus, to solicit the prompt 
assistance of that monarch, whom he had so long neg- 
lected. The King concealed the inward satisfaction 
he felt at this long wished-for result. " I am sorry 
for the Elector," said he, with dissembled coldness, 
to the ambassador, "had he heeded my repeated 
remonstrances, his country would never have seen the 
face of an enemy, and Magdeburg would not have 
fallen. Now, when necessity leaves him no alterna- 
tive, he has recourse to my assistance. But tell him 
that I cannot, for the sake of the Elector gf Saxony, 
ruin my own cause and that of my confederates. 
What pledge have I for the sincerity of a Prince whose 
minister is in the pay of Austria, aiad who will aban- 



70 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

don me as soon as the Emperor flatters him, and with- 
draws his troops from his territory ?" 

Arnheim, an able and cunning man, who had been 
charged with this delicate negotiation, was ordered to 
succeed at any price. Therefore, in spite of the 
severe and discouraging answer, he pressed the King 
to name the conditions on which he would afford assis- 
tance to Saxony, and offered to guaranty their accep- 
tance. '' I require," said Gustavus, ^' that the Elector 
shall cede to me the fortress of Wittenberg: deliver. to 
me his eldest son as hostage, furnish my troops with 
three months' pay, and deliver up to me the traitors 
among his ministry." 

"Not Wittenberg alone," said the Elector, when he 
received this answer, and hurried back his minister to 
the Swedish camp, "not Wittenberg alone, but Torgau, 
and all Saxony shall be open to him ; my whole family 
shall be his hostages; and if that is insufficient, I will 
place myself in his hands. Return and inform him, 
I am ready to deliver to him any traitors he shall 
name, to furnish his army with the money he requires, 
and to venture my life and fortune in the good cause." 
Then the King, who intended only to test John- 
George's sincerity, convinced of the soundness of his 
resolutions, retracted these harsh demands. "The 
distrust," said he, "which he had shown to myself 
when advancing to the relief of Magdeburg, had natu- 
rally excited mine; the Elector's present confidence 
demands a return. I am satisfied, provided he grants 
my army one month's pay; and even for this advance 
I hope to indemnify him." 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 71 

On September 1st, 1631, the two Princes signed a 
treaty of alliance, in consequence of which the Saxon 
army joined the Swedish (September 5th). Already, 
Tilly stood before Leipzig, and fired on the city. To 
rouse the courage of his soldiers, he said in his coun- 
cil of war: "Hitherto heretics have never gained 
a victory in a pitched battle." Gustavus-Adolphus, 
on the contrary, told the captains of his army, as- 
sembled around him, the evening before the battle: 
*•! will neither despise our adversaries, nor represent 
the affair as more easy than it is. I do not conceal it; 
we have before us an experienced, powerful, victorious 
enemy, who has hitherto, during his long wars, always 
been triumphant. But the more celebrated this enemy 
is, the greater will be the renown which we shall ob- 
tain by conquering him. All honor, praise and glory 
which our adversaries have acquired, during so many 
years, can, with the help of God, be .our own within 
twenty-four hours. On our side is the right. We do 
not contend for temporal goods, but for the glory and 
the word of God, for the true religion which alone is 
able to save, hitherto grievously oppressed by the 
Catholics, and which they now intend entirely to de- 
stroy. We must not doubt that Almighty God, who, 
in spite of all resistance, has led us safely through all 
kinds of danger, will now grant us his efficient assis- 
tance." Then he rode through the camp, and ad- 
dressed cheering and afi*ectionate words to the soldiers 
severally.' 

Early on the morning of September 9th, 1631, the 
hostile armies came in sight of each other, between 



72 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

Breitenfeld and Leipzig. It was here that the two 
most illustrious captains of Europe, Gustavus-Adol- 
phus and Tillj, were going to fight a battle, which 
was to decide not only the superiority of the one 
over the other, but also the future of Protestant- 
ism and Catholicism. On the success of this day hung 
much more than a high military reputation, viz., the 
existence of the Reformation in Germany. Gustavus- 
Adolphus knew it well, and he displayed, in the dispo- 
sition of his troops, all the resources of his admirable 
genius. The united troops of the Emperor and the 
League, on this day, did not amount to thirty-four 
thousand men; the Swedes and Saxons were about 
the same number. But had a million been confronted 
with a million, it could only have rendered the action 
more bloody, certainly not more important and deci- 
sive. 

Tilly's 'usual intrepidity and resolution seemed to 
forsake him on this eventful day. He had formed no 
regular place for giving battle to the King, and 'he 
displayed as little firmness in avoiding it. Contrary 
to his own judgment, Pappenheim had forced him to 
action. Doubts, which he had never before felt, strug- 
gled in his bosom; gloomy forebodings clouded his 
ever open brow; the shade of Magdeburg seemed to 
hover over him. 

A cannonade of two hours commenced the battle; 
the wind, which was from the West, blew thick clouds 
of smoke and dust from the newly ploughed and 
parched fields into the faces of the Swedes. This 
compelled the King insensibly to move northward, and 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 73 

the rapidity with which this movement was executed, 
left no time to the enemy to prevent it. 

Tilly at last left his positions, and began the first 
attack upon the Swedes; but, to avoid their hot fire, he 
moved to the right, and fell upon the Saxons with 
such impetuosity, that their line was broken, and the 
whole army thrown into confusion. The Elector him- 
self retired to Eilenburg, though a few regiments still 
maintained their ground upon the field, and by a bold 
stand saved the honor of Saxony. 

Pappenheim had thrown himself, with the whole force 
of his cavalry upon the right wing of the Swedes, but 
without being able to make it waver. The King com- 
manded here in person. Seven times did Pappenheim 
renew the attack, and seven times was he repulsed. 
He fled at last with great loss, and abandoned the 
field to his conquerors. ^ 

In the mean time, Tilly, having routed the remainder 
of the Saxons, attacked with his victorious troops the 
left wing of the Swedes. To this wing, the King, as 
soon as he perceived that the Saxons were thrown into 
disorder, had, with a ready foresight, detached a rein- 
forcement of three regiments to cover its flank, which 
the flight of the Saxons had left exposed. Gustavus 
Horn, who commanded here, showed the enemy so 
spirited a resistance, that they were already beginning 
to relax the vigor of their attack, when Gustavus- 
Adolphus appeared to terminate the contest. Then the 
left wing of the Imperialists having been routed, and the 
King's division having no longer any enemy to oppose, 
astavus-Adolphus attacked the heights on which the 
7 



74 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

enemy's artillery was planted. Gaining possession of 
them in a short time, he turned upon the enemy the 
full fire of their own cannons. 

The play of artillery upon their flank, and the terri- 
ble onslaught of the Swedes in front, threw this 
hitherto invincible army into confusion. A sudden 
retreat was the only course left to Tilly, but even this 
was to be made through the midst of the conquerors. 
The whole army was in disorder, with the exception of 
four regiments of veteran soldiers, who never as yet 
had fled from the field, and were resolved not to do so 
now. They maintained their resistance till night, 
*vhen their number was reduced to six hundred men, 
they availed themselves of the darkness to retreat from 
the battle-field, of which the Swedes, whose victory was 
complete, remained undisputed masters. 

^mid the dead and the wounded Gustavus-Adolphus 
threw himself on his knees; and the first joy of his 
victory gushed forth in fervent prayer. Then he 
mounted his horse, and, proceeding from rank to rank, 
he returned his thanks to his brave soldiers. He him- 
self, without coat of mail- had been present wherever 
danger was greatest. 

On this very day, he announced his victory to his 
chancellor in these simple words: "Although we 
mourn the loss of ihany brave men, we must neverthe- 
less above all thank God for this victory and protec- 
tion, which he vouchsafed to us, for we have never in- 
curred greater danger." 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. ' 75 

On the battle-field now stands a monument witli tlie 
inscription : 

GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS, 

The Christian and the Hero^ 
SAVED, NEAR BREITENFELD, 

Religious Liberty to the "World. 



CHAPTER Y. 



CONTIJSrUATION' OF THE SUCCESSES OF 
G USTA VUS-AD OLPEUS. 

HIS SOJOUKN IN FRANKFORT — HIS ENTRANCE INTO NUREMBERG — 
BATTLE OF THE LECH. 

HE consequences of the victory of Leipzig were 
immense. In this battle Gustavus-Adolphus 
reaped the fruits of more than one year of 
fatigue, of unimportant contests and deprivations of 
every kind. The united forces of the Catholic League 
and of the Emperor were annihilated. Of a formidable 
army there remained only two thousand combatants, 
and Tilly discredited and discouraged by an irretriev- 
able defeat. Gustavus could do as he pleased and go 
wherever he wished. The gallant Swedes had thrown 
down all the obstacles with which Austria had opposed 
them, and henceforth nothing could stop their progress. 
The King of Sweden, who stood in the heart of Ger- 
many without a rival, or without an adversary that 
was a match for him, did not abuse his victory. His 
first thought, after having thanked God, was a,th ought 
of reparation and of justice. He wrote from Halle, 
whither he had pursued and scattered the last remnants 
of the hostile army, a letter, bearing the date of 
September 2Tth, in which he requested his chancellor 
76 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 77 

Oxenstiern to join him in order to regulate the restitu- 
tions, which he wished to make to his despoiled 
i)rethren. He continued to preserve discipline in his 
camp, and his soldiers did not relax their habits of order 
and piety. Every morning, after prayer, they sang a 
favorite hymn* of Gustavus, which expresses the con- 
dition of the Christian soul before God, and breathes 
the most unreserved confidence in God's will. Such 
a morning-hymn, sung by a victorious king at the head 
of his army could only be the effusion of sincere godli- 
ness and must have awakened religious enthusiasm. 

At Halle, Gustavus divided his army. He charged 
the Elector of Saxony, his ally, to penetrate into 
Bohemia, which country was impatient to shake off the 
imperial yoke. On his part, he prepared to conquer 
all western Germany, in order to dispossess Austria 
of the rich countries whence she derived her greatest 
resources, and to crush the Catholic League in its 
different centres. 

The Catholics themselves, who, as well as the Pro- 
testants, were the victims of the covetousness and bad 
treatment of the Imperialists, received Gustavus- 
Adolphus as their liberator. His march from Halle 
throuo^h Thurinojia and Eranconia to the Main and 
Rhine was a triumphal procession. In Thuringia, he 
obtained a new ally, the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, who soon 
became one of his most skillful generals. He issued 



* This hymn commences with the words: "Aus meines Herzens 
Grunde, sag 'ich dir Lob und Dank," (From the bottom of my heart 
I praise and thank Thee). The undersigned does not know 
whether there exists an English translation of it. The Lyra 
Germanica does not contain any. L. W. H. 



78 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

and enforced the strictest orders against all abuse of 
power by the oflficers, and every outrage committed by 
the soldiers. He desired to show himself the more mod- 
erate and just, even where it could not have been ex- 
pected, in countries whose creed he rejected and which 
had always fought against his cause. 

The irreproachable conduct of his army called forth 
admiration and confidence. 

When the Swedish troops approached, the bishop of 
Wurzburg, one of the most bitter enemies of Protestant- 
ism and one of the most active members of the Catho- 
lic League, fled and abandoned his defenceless subjects 
to a powerful and ofi'ended foe. Wurzburg surrendered 
without resistance. The whole bishopric followed the 
example of the capital, and submitted to the Swedes. 
Gustavus considered a country which had been aban- 
doned by its sovereign as his own, and immediately 
appointed a regency, one half of whose members 
were Protestants. He restored to the Protestants 
their property and opened churches to them, but with- 
out retaliating on the Catholics the cruelties which 
they had practiced on his coreligionists. On such 
only as, sword in hand, refused to submit, were the 
fearful rights of war enforced. Those who were 
peaceably disposed, or defenceless, were treated with 
mildness. It was a sacred principle of Gustavus to 
spare the blood of his enemies, as well as that of his 
own troops. 

By every where practicing the same toleration, he 
has had the imperishable honor of being the first prince, 
who has understood the great principle of religious 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. T9 

liberty. In the very midst of a war kindled by reli- 
gious fanaticism, he proclaimed in Europe the sacred 
rights of conscience. So much honesty and mildness 
disarmed the most inveterate hatred, and Gustavus- 
Adolphus was to most of the Catholics, if not a 
deliverer, at least a good and just master, who re- 
spected their rights and preserved their liberties. At 
the capture of a Catholic town, his officers urged him 
to deal severely with its inhabitants for their hostility 
to the Protestants, and in retaliation for the cruelties 
which had been perpetrated in Magdeburg. The king 
answered: ''I have come to break the chains of 
slavery, aiid not to forge new ones ; let them live, as 
they hitherto have lived." 

Surrounded by the affection, and accepted even by 
the Catholics, Gustavus-Adolphus was sure to succeed, 
had he not met with a new obstacle. The intelligence 
of his victory and triumphal march caused in the 
Catholic courts the greatest consternation.* Eichelieu, 
who had intended to weaken and humiliate Austria, 
trembled when he saw the increasing power of the King 
of Sweden. The preponderance of Austria was fol- 
lowed by the preponderance of the Protestant party. 
On the ruins of the old empire a new empire was going 
to be established, the chief of which would be the great. 
est captain of the epoch. This danger, which threat- 
ened Europe with a revolution, was to be averted. 
Richelieu, the former ally of Gustavus-Adolphus, 



* The King of Poland was quite terrified. One of his courtiers 
exclaimed: " No, it is impossible I I cannot believe that God has 
become a Lutheran !" 



80 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

almost became his enemy. He declared himself the 
protector of the Catholic Princes of Germany, and 
demanded for them neutrality, thus affording them the 
opportunity of arming themselves for Austria, and 
siding in appearance with nobody. By his distrust 
and intrigues he roused the jealousy of the Protestant 
Princes and made them fear in him a master, who 
called himself their friend. The Elector of Saxony 
soon listened to all these imputations and shared all 
these fears. The northern hero was about to stand 
isolated, as at his arrival in Germany. 

Nevertheless he continued to advance, and conquered 
Franconia in a trice. Before Frankfort-on-the-Main 
he met with an unexpected resistance. This opulent 
and populous city had always been attached to the 
imperial cause, in return for commercial privileges 
which she enjoyed. By opening her gates to the 
Swedes, she was afraid of losing her celebrated fairs. 
Summoned to surrender, she sent a deputation to the 
king to explain her embarrassed position and the sel- 
fish reasons, which prevented her from complying with 
his demand. 

Gustavus-x^dolphus was indignant: "I am very 
much astonished," said he to the deputies, "that, when 
the liberties of Germany and the Protestant religion 
are at stake, the citizens of Frankfort talk of annual 
fairs, and postpone, for temporal interests, the great 
cause of their country and their conscience." " I have 
moreover," he continued in a menacing tone, "found 
the keys of every town and fortress from the island of 
Rugen to the Main, and know also where to find a 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 81 

key to Frankfort ; the safety of Germany, and the 
freedom of the Protestant Church are the sole objects 
of my invasion ; conscious of the justice of my cause I 
am determined not to allow any obstacle to impede my 
progress. I am well aware that the inhabitants of 
Frankfort wish to stretch out only a finger to me, but 
I must have the whole hand, in order to have some- 
thing to grasp." At the head of the army, he closely 
followed the deputies as they carried back his answer, 
and, in order of battle, awaited in the neighborhood 
the decision of the council. 

These frank and energetic words, accompanied with 
menacing preparations, admitted neither of reply nor 
delay. The gates were, therefore, opened to the King 
of Sweden, who marched his army through this impe- 
rial town in magnificent procession, and in admirable 
order. In this city, a number of princes and ambas- 
sadors assembled to congratulate Gustavus on his suc- 
cess, and either to conciliate his favor, or to appease 
his indignation. This brilliant company, that sur- 
rounded him, displeased the Queen Maria-Eleanor and 
the Chancellor Oxenstiern. Under all these appear- 
ances of devotion, and through all these protestations 
of friendship, the Queen, guided by her womanly 
instinct and tenderness, the Chancellor, enlightened 
by his experience in afi'airs and his consummate prudence, 
had recognized the distrust and envy with which 
Gustavus -Adolphus inspired all these sovereigns, and 
the disunion which prevailed among them. 

The KinfT himself did not mistake the feelinors of his 
allies. He was sometimes deeply grieved and almost 



82 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

dejected. He felt pained to see his intentions miscon- 
strued, and the great cause, which he defended, 
compromitted every moment by paltry jealousy and 
the meanest interests. Once, he could not forbear 
expressing his feelings with bitterness in the presence 
of many Princes. " I wish to make peace," said he, 
'•if I am offered honorable conditions, such as will 
secure the welfare of Protestant Princes and their op- 
pressed subjects, for whose sake I have undertaken 
this war and shed my blood." "But I shall never 
conclude a peace by which the honor of the Protestant 
Princes would be sacrificed, their unhappy subjects 

obliged to bear an iron yoke, and our religion seriously 
compromitted." 

He knew very well, that there were traitors among 
his guests, and that George, Landgrave of Hesse- 
Darmstadt, who was ambitious of reconciling the two 
parties, held secret intercourse with the Emperor, 
though he appeared to be very much attached to the 
King. Therefore, on the same occasion, Gustavus 
said to this Prince: " If the Emperor does not care for 
me, I shall not care for him; you may inform him of 
this, for I know that you are all well disposed towards 
his majesty." The Landgrave, confused by this unex- 
pected apostrophe, stammered a few excuses, but the 
King interrupted him, and added: "He who receives 
a reward of thirty thousand dollars a year, has indeed 
a reason to be the Emperor's friend. Were I to make 
such a present to some one, he must have well deserved 
it. It would be easy for me to enter into negotiation, 
did I not consider the danger of those who have acted 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 83' 

a prominent part in the struggle for the restoration of 
true reliirion." 

The King was not onlj surrounded by traitors and 
by open enemies, but also exposed to the poniards of 
assassins. His most implacable foes were the Jesuits. 
First they ridiculed him in words and publications, 
then they defamed him and made every effort to 
alienate from him people and Princes. Jesuits were 
sent from Germany to France to provoke among the 
high and low of this country a hostile disposition 
towards him. While in Menz, they offered public pray- 
ers for his welfare, they paid assassins to take his life. 
One evening there was an armed individual in his 
room. He was arrested, and found to be a Catholic 
priest of Antwerp. About the same time, at Vienna, 
a Jesuit, during two successive Lord's days, invited his 
hearers to pray for the successful execution of a pro- 
ject which God and one man alone knew, and on which 
rested the welfare of the Romish Church. 

In these circumstances, it was thought the King's 
duty to be on his guard, and to watch over his personal 
safety more than he had done heretofore. "A king," 
answered Gustavus-Adolphus, "cannot live shut up in 
a box. The wicked have not so much power as will, 
and confidence in God is the best safeguard. There- 
fore I do not consider this danger formidable. More- 
over, my loss, had this man succeeded, would not have 
been so injurious to you as you think. God knows 
how long He will use my weak arm. If I fall, He 
will employ another instrument, worthier and more 
powerful than I. His work does not depend on one 



84 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 

man's life." To his friends, insisting upon greater pre- 
cautions, he replied with animation : ^' Do jou wish me 
to mistrust Providence?" 

The general clamor of discontent which the Jesuits 
raised in all the Catholic courts, against the alliance 
between France and the enemy of the Church, at last 
compelled Richelieu to take a step to convince the 
Roman Catholic world of the zeal of France. His 
only aim being the humiliation of Austria, he hoped to 
gain the great object of his policy, and to satisfy, at 
the same time, the demands of the Jesuits, by separating 
the interests of the Catholic League from those of 
Ferdinand. Therefore he promised to the Catholic 
Princes, on the part of Sweden, a complete neutrality, 
as soon as they abandoned their alliance with the Em- 
peror, and withdrew their troops. He hoped that, 
Ferdinand being isolated, Grustavus-Adolphus would 
direct his undivided force against the hereditary 
dominions of Austria, and accomplish the downfall 
of this house. NBat if the French court had powerful 
motives for wishing for this neutrality, the King of 
Sweden had as grave reasons for desiring the contrary. 
Convinced by numerous proofs that the hatred of 
the Princes of the League to the Protestant religion 
was invincible, their aversion to the foreign power of 
the Swedes inextinguishable, and their attachment to 
the House of Austria irrevocable, he apprehended less 
danger from their open hostility, than from a neutrality 
which was so little in unison with their real inclina- 
tion; and, moreover, as he was constrained to carry on 
the war in Germany at the expense of the enemy, he 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 85 

manifestlj sustained great loss, if he diminisliecl their 
number without increasing that of his friends. It was 
not surprising, therefore, if Gustavus evinced little in- 
clination to purchase the neutrality of the League by 
which he was likely to gain so little, at the expense of 
the advantages he had already obtained. 

The conditions, accordingly, upon which he offered 
to adopt the neutrality towards Bavaria, T^ere severe 
and suited to these views. He required of the whole 
League a full and entire cessation from all hostilities ; 
the recall of their troops from the imperial army, from 
the conquered towns, and from all the Protestant 
countries; the reduction of their military force; the 
exclusion of the Imperial armies from their territories, 
and from supplies either of men, provisions, or ammu- 
nition ; the restoration of all property which had been 
taken from the Protestants; the concession of reli- 
gious liberty, and the expulsion of the Jesuits. Hard 
as the conditions were, which the victor thus imposed 
upon the vanquished, the French Mediator flattered 
himself, he should be able to induce the Elector of 
Bavaria to accept them. In order to give time for an 
accommodation, Gustavus had agreed to a cessation of 
hostilities for a fortnight. But at the very time, when 
this monarch was receiving from the Prench agents 
repeated assurances of the favorable progress of the 
negotiation, an intercepted letter from the Elector to 
Pappenheim, the generalissimo of the Austrian army, 
revealed the perfidy of that Prince, as having no 
other object in view by the whole negotiation than to 
gain time for his secret preparations for war. Gusta- 
8 



8G GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

vus, irritated by this knavery^ informed France of it 
and declared his intention to invade Bavaria. When 
the Pope, Urban YIII., was informed of this determina- 
tion, he said : " The Kino; of Sweden takes a necessary 
and wise resolution. He would commit a great im- 
prudence, if he advanced anywhere before having 
crushed Maximilian." Truth requires us moreover to 
state, that neither the Jesuits nor the Emperor suc- 
ceeded in inducing this Pope to take any serious steps 
against Gustavus-Adolphus, because he was fully con- 
vinced that the King of Sweden did not intend to 
oppress the Catholic religion, but was willing to grant 
religious liberty to all. 

While waiting for a favorable moment, the King of 
Sweden crossed the Rhine, where the Spaniards made 
only a vain resistance, and on December 13th, 1631, 
Mentz, after a siege of four days, opened her gates. 
He stopped for some time in this city, and left his 
generals to complete the conquest of the surrounding 
country. 

His rest was not of long duration. Recalled into 
Franconia by Tilly's successes, who had expelled the 
Swedish troops from the bishopric of Bamberg, and 
was marching on Nuremberg, he hastened to meet the 
Bavarian general, and forced him to retreat towards 
the Danube. 

Thus he reached Nuremberg, where he was enthu- 
siastically received, March 21st. He entered the town 
with a small escort of dragoons and mounted arquebu. 
siers. He had left his army at FUrth, a town at some 
distance from this city. The generals and the German 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 87 

Princes wbom he had delivered accompanied him. 
The magistrates and the prominent inhabitants went 
to meet him and offered him the keys, as a sign of 
obedience and loyaltj. The people, who thronged 
the streets, gave vent to their joy by cheering and 
shouting. The ringing of bells and the roaring of 
cannons mingled with the acclamations of the multitude. 
This welcome deeply affected the King. The noble 
appearance of his person, completed the impression 
produced by his glorious exploits, and the condescen- 
sion with which he received the congratulations of this 
free city won all hearts. 

When Gustavus-Adolphus had arrived in the apart- 
ments which had been prepared, the presents, offered 
by the city, were delivered to him. They consisted of 
considerable sums of money, and of two silver orbs of 
remarkable workmanship. Then the King addressed 
the magistrates and burghers in the following words, 
which were immediately penned down and spread, by 
thousands of copies, among the inhabitants : "I thank 
you and the city for these valuable presents. In re- 
turn, I can wish you nothing better than perseverance 
in the evangelic faith. May nothing avert you from 
it, neither threats nor promises, nor any passion to 
which human nature is liable. You have given me 
the emblems of heaven and earth; may the riches of 
the earth not make you forgetful of the still more pre- 
cious treasures of heaven. I ask for you this grace of 
God. We have cunning, wicked and powerful enemies. 
All their thoughts are bent upon the destruction of Pro- 
testantism. Apparently they seek peace, but it would 



88 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 

indeed prove fatal to you and to all Protestants, and 
ruinous to many millions of souls." 

" God has entrusted you witli the administration of 
a rich and powerful city ; I do not doubt of your gov- 
erning it so that you need not fear the account which 
will one day be required of you before God's tribunal." 

"Your city, encompassed with dangers and perse- 
cutions, has, as yet, been miraculously preserved; I 
have been not less astonishingly protected since 
arriving in these countries. I had expected to see the 
end of the world rather than your city. In the mis- 
fortunes that have befallen your brethren, and in your 
own sufferings, God intended to make you feel and 
acknowledge what great sinners we all are. It is for 
your sake, for the defense of the Gospel, that I have 
left my peaceful, native land, and come to these dis- 
turbed countries. I have sacrificed the resources of 
my poor subjects, their blood, exposed my life, and re- 
nounced domestic happiness. I shall do all that the 
grace of God will give me the strength to do. On 
your side, learn to suffer, during a short time, if it is 
necessary for our holy cause ; remain faithful to it. 
God will bless you. He will increase your city, make 
it prosperous, and your renown will be spread every- 
where. Let us together praise, magnify and glorify 
God here on earth, and in heaven forever." 

After dinner the King left the city, surrounded by 
a population more enthusiastic still than when he 
arrived. Mothers lifted up their children, that they 
might see the hero, and impress his countenance on 
their youthful minds. Old people wept with joy that 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 89 

tliey had lived to -witness the protector of the Protes- 
tant Cburch. To perpetuate the remembrance of his 
visit, painters took his portrait, which was scattered 
ia many copies, and poets sang his virtues. The verses, 
which were composed on this occasion, bear that bibli- 
cal stamp which is peculiar to the Protestant authors 
of that time — Gustavus is called therein a new Gideon, 
a second Joshua, another David, who has thrown down 
Goliath, a man like the pious Maccabseus. 

After a short stay in Nuremberg, Gustavus-Adolphus 
followed his army to the Danube, and appeared unex- 
pectedly before the frontier-town of Donauwoerth, 
celebrated for the misfortunes it had incurred, in its 
ardent zeal for Reformation. A numerous Bavarian 
garrison defended the place, and their commander 
showed at first a resolute determination to defend it, 
till the arrival of Tilly. But the vigor with which 
Gustavus prosecuted the siege, soon compelled him to 
take measures for a speedy and secure retreat, which, 
amid a tremendous fire from the Swedish artillery, 
he successfully executed. The Evangelical worship, 
which had been abolished by the Duke of Bavaria, was 
re-established. 

The conquest of Donauwoerth made the King master 
of the Danube, and now the small river Lech alone 
separated him from the states of Maximilian, the bul. 
wark of Catholicism in Germany. Protected by this 
river, which had been transformed into a raging tor- 
rent by the melting of snow from the Tyrol Mountains, 
the Bavarians under Tilly's, and their Duke's leader, 
bhip, occupied a strongly fortified camp which seemed 

8* 



90 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

to bid defiance to every assult. The bravest and most 
skillful generals of the Swedish army considered this 
position as impregnable, and any attack as a foolhardy 
enterprise. "What," said the King to Gustavus 
Horn, who opposed more energetically than all the 
others this perilous undertaking, *'we have crossed 
the Baltic, and so many great rivers of Germany, and 
we shall now be checked by a brook like the Lech!" 

Gustavus had already, at the peril of his life, recon- 
noitered the ground, and discovered that his own side 
of the river was higher than the other, and consequent- 
ly gave a considerable advantage to the fire of the 
Swedish artillery over that of the enemy. With great 
presence of mind, he determined to profit by this cir- 
cumstance. He immediately caused three batteries 
to be erected, from which seventy- two field-pieces 
maintained a cross fire upon the enemy. While this 
tremendous cannonade drove the Bavarians from the 
opposite bank, he caused a bridge to be erected over 
the river, with all possible rapidity. A thick smoke, 
kept up by burning wood and wet straw, concealed for 
some time the progress of the work from the enemy, 
while the continued thunder of the cannon overpow- 
ered the noise of the axes. He kept alive, by his own 
example, the courage of his troops, and discharged 
more than sixty cannons with his own hand. The 
cannonade was returned by the Bavarians with equal 
vivacity, for two hours, though with less efi'ect, as the 
Swedish batteries swept the lower opposite bank, 
while their height served as a breast-work to their 
own troops. In vain, therefore, did the Bavarians 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 91 

attempt to destroy these works; the superior fire of 
the Swedes threw them into disorder, and the bridge 
was completed under their very eyes. On this dread- 
ful day, Tilly did every thing in his power to encourage 
his troops, and no danger could drive him from the 
bank. At length, mortally wounded, he was obliged to 
see in the young, triumphant Gustavus-Adolphus the 
minister of divine justice, who punished him for the 
crimes which he had perpetrated in Magdeburg. De- 
prived of the animating presence of their general, the 
Bavarians gave way, and Maximilian, overcome by the 
persuasions of the dying Tilly, gave up this impregna- 
ble position for lost. The same night, 5th of April, 
before a single Swede had crossed the Lech, he broke 
up his camp and retreated in good order to Neuburg 
and Ingolstadt. 

When the King had closely examined the hostile camp, 
and the admirable intrenchments which defended it, he 
said: "Had I been the Bavarian, though a cannon-ball 
had carried away my beard and chin, never would I 
have abandoned a position like this, and laid open my 
territory to my enemies." 

This victory opened Bavaria to Gustavus-Adolphus. 
He could unmolested penetrate into this country, but 
wished first to relieve Augsburg, with which city great 
and pious reminiscences were connected. It surren- 
dered on April 14th. The Edict of Restitution had 
deprived the Protestants of this town of divine service, 
had placed at their head a Catholic administration, and 
Protestant Germany was grieved to see the Augsburg 
Confession outraged even in its birth-place. Gustavus- 



92 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 

Adolpliiis expelled the Bavarian garrison, wbicli occu- 
pied the city ; and replaced the Catholic authorities by 
'otestant magistrates, who took the oath of loyalty. 
Then he proceeded with his whole retinue to St. Ann's 
Church, which he restored, as well as the others, to the 
Lutheran worship. Here, his chaplain, Dr. Fabricius, 
preached from the 5th verse of Psalm xii. ^' For the 
oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, 
now will I arise, saith the Lord: I will set him in safety 
from him that puffeth at him." After this sermon, 
Psalm ciii. was sung with an accompaniment of beau- 
tiful music. It was not without a very lively emotion 
that the citizens of Augsburg sang this hymn, which 
corresponded so well with the grateful feelings that per- 
vaded their hearts and which, so to say, described to 
them their deliverance. 

''Bless the Lord, my soul, and forget not all His 
benefits. 

''The Lord executeth righteousness and judgment 
for all that are oppressed, etc." 

Several days were spent in festivals and public re- 
joicings. 



CHAPTER VI. 



LAST CAMPAIGN'S OF GUSTAVUS- 
ADOLPHUS. 

SIEGE OF IXGOLSTADT. — CONQUEST OF BAVARIA. — WALLEXSTEIX'S 
EXPEDITION AGAINST NUEEMBEEG. 

^%, FTER his defeat, Maximilian had taken refuge 
/^rV behind the walls of Infjolstadt. Gustavus-Adol- 
phus, anxious to obtain a firm footing on the 
Danube, and to complete the destruction of the Bava- 
rian army, did not indulge in the festivities of Augs- 
burg, but advanced already on the 15th of April against 
this stronghold, whose possession was very important. 
But the bravery of the garrison, which had been in- 
creased by Maximilian's troops, and the solidity of its 
fortifications, foiled his attempt. During the siege of 
this town, the King nearly lost his life, on the same 
day (April 20th), when Tilly died within of his wounds. 
While reconnoitering the works a twenty-four-pounder 
struck his horse, which broke down and involved him 
in its fall. Those who surrounded him uttered shrieks, 
of dismay, and rushed towards him, afraid of finding a 
corpse. Gustavus-Adolphus, at the same moment, all 
covered with blood and dust, rose saying: "The apple 
is not yet ripe." His horse had been killed, and his 
young friend, the Margrave of Baden, who stood near 
him, had his head carried away by a second ball, a few 
moments afterwards. On his return to the camp, the 

93 



9J: GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

King was congratuliited hj Lis officers, Trho, at the 
same time, manifested their recrrcts at the Martrrave's 
untimely end. The King answered them: "The Mar- 
grave's death and the ball which passed so close to me 
recall to my mind my mortality. — Man, thou must die! 
that is the old law from which neither my high descent, 
nor my royal crown, nor my arms, nor my numerous 
victories can save me. I submit to God's will and guid- 
ance. If he remove me from this world, he will not for- 
sake the holy cause which I now defend." 
. Gustavus-Adolphus, like all true disciples of Jesus 
Christ, often thought of his end, and seriously prepared 
himself to meet his God. He knew that but a gasp 
separates time from eternity, and that death is the be- 
ginning of a new life. The fascination of power had 
not dazzled him so as to make him forgetful of his 
frailty and of the judgment which was awaiting him 
beyond the tomb. The bubble of glory had not con- 
cealed heaven from him. His deep humility, his con- 
tinued perception of his sinfulness and his recourse to 
God's grace prove it. The more he advanced in life, 
the more eno-rossed he was with death and the salva- 

o 

tion of his soul, the more sedulous he was not to be 
surprised by the coming of his Divine Master. He had 
a salutary presentiment of his early departure. Hence 
his mildness and mercifulness, which we are forced 
so much the more to admire, because practiced in coun- 
tries where, as in Bavaria, the remembrance of the 
wrongs, which Protestants had suffered, must have pre- 
disposed him to inflict well deserved punishment upon 
the adversaries of Reformation. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 95 

The occupation of Ratisbon by the Bavarians caus- 
ed . Gustavus-Adolphus to resolve upon raising the 
siege of Ingolstadt, and to penetrate into the interior 
of Bavaria, in order to draw the Elector into that 
quarter for the defense of his territories, and thus to 
strip the Danube of its defenders. But, before he had 
carried into effect this plan of operations, France sent 
an ambassador to stop him by negotiating peace for 
Bavaria. To all the reasons invoked in favor of 
Maximilian, and of his pretended neutrality, the King 
of Sweden replied : "I clearly see that you have only 
come to impose upon me ; I cannot believe that the 
Puke of Bavaria seriously intends to come to a settle- 
ment of our differences. I know him and his priest- 
hood too well. He wears a double cassock, and accord- 
ing to circumstances, he turns it, to-day the red, to- 
morrow the blue. This time I shall not be deceived." 
The ambassador, then passing from entreaties to threats, 
spoke in very high terms of the military strength of 
France, which could, said he, abandon Sweden to her- 
self and supply Bavaria with forty thousand men. 
''If France withdraws from me her alliance," — replied 
Gustavus-Adolphus immediately, — "well ! I shall have 
that of the Turks, and the Turks are no worse allies 
than the Papists with their idolatry. At all events, 
I know that I can rely on the help of Almighty God, 
who has sent me into Germany." — Undoubtedly the 
Duke of Bavaria only wished to keep him inactive, un- 
til Wallenstein should have gathered the auxiliary 
troops w^hich this general had promised to the Emperor. 
For the latter in his great distress had applied again to 



96 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

the man whom he had formerly dismissed and humbly 
requested his help. Wallenstein finally promised his 
assistance, but on such conditions, as to make of the 
Emperor his servant. 

In spite of Louis XIIL, the Goth advanced on the 
Bavarian territory without encountering a soldier to 
contend with him for the passage. Hitherto the Swedes 
had found the inhabitants of the different countries, on 
the whole, friendly disposed, but now they had entered 
a State whose people harbored the most hostile feelings 
to them. Religious fanaticism had been aroused by the 
priests to such a degree, that each Bavarian considered 
it his sacred duty to preserve his country from the 
impure contact of the heretics. The King of Sweden 
was to them the Antichrist^ and in their public prayers 
they asked of God to deliver them from the Swedish 
devil. To kill a Swede, no matter by what means, was 
a meritorious deed. Bands of peasants were organized 
and woe to the Swedish soldier who fell into their hands ! 
All the torments, which inventive malice could de- 
vise, were exercised upon these unhappy victims ; and 
the sight of their mangled bodies exasperated the army 
to a fearful retaliation. Gustavus-Adolphus, at the 
view of these horrors, sometimes felt his blood boil 
with anger, and thoughts of vengeance arose in his 
mind. But he soon overcame these first impulses and 
sullied the lustre of his heroic character by no act of 
revenge. Instead of maltreating these madmen, who 
made his soldiers suffer martyrdom, and considered him 
an imp of Satan, he showed them by his kindness and 
patience, that he was a better Christian than they were. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 97 

He attended more energetically than ever to the main- 
tenance of discipline, and answered the most implaca- 
ble hatred by an inexhaustible clemency. 

As soon as the Swe^dish army appeared before the 
town of Landshut, the garrison fled and the inhabi- 
tants concealed themselves to escape the retaliation, 
which they considered well merited and unavoidable. 
Tranquilized by the pacific attitude of their conquerors, 
struck by their moderation and by the order which 
reigned in their ranks, the citizens reappeared, and the 
most eminent from among them threw themselves at 
the King's feet, supplicating him to spare them as well 
as the town. Gustavus answered them: "When I 
think of the cruelties which you have practiced on my 
soldiers, I ask indeed the question, whether you are 
men, or ferocious animals, and I know not how I can 
have compassion on you." He refused to promise any- 
thing and even left the town, in which a death-like si- 
lence reigned, without having come to a decision. The 
sky was cloudy. While the King went away, he was 
dazzled by lightning, and a dreadful thunderclap re- 
echoed. This roar reminded him of the living God, 
whose chastisements are dreadful, and who will not for- 
give those who are unforgiving, and Landshut wa3 
only obliged to pay one hundred thousand dollars, as a 
contribution for war expenses. 

From Landshut Gustavus-Adolphus proceeded to 
Munich. The approach of the King spread terror and 
consternation in the capital, which placed all its hopes 
in the magnanimity of the conqueror. By an uncon- 
ditional and voluntary surrender, it hoped to disarm 
9 



98 GUSTAYU3-AD0LPHUS. 

his vengeance, and sent deputies, as far as Freysingen, 
to lay at his feet the keys of the city. The King said 
to this deputation : " You have done well. With justice 
I might have avenged on your city the fall of Magde- 
burg. But be not afraid about your property, your 
families and your religion. Go in peace." And true 
to his word, Gustavus did not retaliate, and refused to 
satisfy the resentment of the Germans, who desired him 
to revenge the sack of Magdeburg on the capital of its 
destroyer. The very helplessness of his enemies dis- 
armed his severity. He contented himself with the 
more noble triumph of conducting the unfortunate 
King of Bohemia, the Palatine Frederick, with the 
pomp of a victor, into the very palace of the Prince, 
who had been the chief instrument of his ruin, and the 
usurper of his territories, and heightened the brilliancy 
of his triumphal entry by the brighter splendor of mod- 
eration and clemency. By his kindness, the King won 
the hearts of the inhabitants, who could not forbear 
paying homage to the virtues of so generous an adver- 
sary. The Jesuits themselves, flattered by his conde- 
scension and affability, praised his magnanimity. When 
he visited their convent, the superior addressed him in 
a Latin speech in which he exalted his eminent quali- 
ties. The King answered in the same language and 
entered into a discussion of the Lord's Supper. He 
vigorously maintained the evangelical doctrines on this 
important point, without ever deviating from the terms 
of the most perfect courtesy, and the most sincere re- 
spect for the opinions of his antagonists. His old (j61onels 
murmured against so much kindness and said: *' The 



GUSTAVU3-AD0LPHUS. 99 

King had better expel these Jesuits than discourse 
Vfith them." Gustavus guessed their thoughts, and, 
Avhen leaving the convent, he said to them smiling: "Why 
would you persecute these men ? Do you not see, how 
much they injure the cause they defend, and how use- 
ful they are to that which they combat?" Wise and 
profound words, containing a lesson from which our 
age may also derive benefit, as well as the age of the 
great King of Sweden ! 

The King found in Munich only a forsaken palace, 
for the Elector's treasures had been carried away. The 
mag;nificence of the building; astonished him: and he 
asked the guide, who showed the apartments, who was 
the architect. '-No other," replied he, "than the 
Elector himself." — "I wish," said the King, "I had 
this architect to send to Stockholm." — "That," he was 
answered, "the architect will take care to prevent." 
When the arsenal was examined, they found nothing 
but carriages, stripped of their cannons. The latter 
had been so artfully concealed under the floor, that no 
traces of them remained; and, but for the treachery of 
a workman, the deceit would not have been detected. 
"Rise up from the dead," said the King, " and come 
to judgment." The floor was pulled up, and one hun- 
dred and forty pieces of cannon discovered. A trea- 
sure of thirty thousand gold ducats, concealed in one 
of the largest, completed the pleasure which the King 
received from this valuable acquisition. 

Gustavus- Adolphus did not remain long in Munich 
whose magnificence he admired and which he called, 
on account of its melancholy and barren environs, a 



100 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

gold saddle on a had horse. Wallenstein, at the liead 
of a powerful army, advanced to meet liim. 

Thus far had Gustavus advanced from victory to 
victory, without meeting with an enemy able to cope 
with him. A part of Bavaria and Suabia, the bishop- 
rics of Franconia, the Lower Palatinate and the arch- 
bishopric of Mentz lay subdued in his rear. The 
Catholic League was weakened. His ally, the Elector 
of Saxony^ had conquered Bohemia and was advancing 
against Austria, while he himself was rapidly moving 
to the same point. A long war had exhausted the 
strength of the Austrian monarchy, wasted the coun- 
try and diminished the armies, which, moreover, were 
destitute of generals that inspired the soldiers with the 
confidence of victory. The confederates of the Empe- 
ror were disarmed, or their fidelity shaken. Most of 
the Protestant States were openly declaring against 
Austria. The Hungarian frontier was threatened by 
the Transylvanian Prince, Ragosky, while Turkey was 
making great preparations, to profit by the favorable 
conjuncture for aggression. To complete the embar- 
rassment, a dangerous insurrection broke out in the 
territory of the Ens, where the fanaticism of the gov- 
ernment had provoked the Protestants to resistance. 
Thus the Emperor saw himself on the brink of an abyss. 
There was but one man able to avert the danger, that 
was threatening the Austrian monarchy, and that one 
had been mortally afi'ronted. The Emperor hesitated 
for some time, but the pressure increasing every day, 
he finally resolved to intrust Wallenstein again with 
the command of the army. This general first pretend- 



GU.STAVUS-ADOLnHUS. 131 

e-.l to decline, but, at last, yielded to the most urgent 
solicitations, after the Emperor had conceded the most 
humiliating conditions, hj which he was deprived of all 
control over the armies, and placed at the mercy of the 
proud Duke. In less than three months, this great 
captain raised an army of forty thousand men, com- 
manded by experienced officers, and inflamed by en- 
thusiasm. He restored Bohemia to the Emperor in" 
less time than it had been lost, and at the end of May, 
not a single Saxon soldier remained in this country. 
While he was conquering Bohemia, Gustavus-Adol- 
phus had been gaining the victories, already detailed 
on the Rhine and the Danube, and carried the war to 
the frontiers of Bavaria. Maximilian, defeated on the 
Lech, and deprived by death of Count Tilly, his best 
support, besought Wallenstein to come to his assist- 
ance. But although his request was seconded by Fer- 
dinand's order, the Duke of Friedland remained inac- 
tive in Bohemia and abandoned the Elector to his fate. 
The remembrance that Maximilian had been instru- 
mental in his dismission, was deeply engraved in the 
implacable mind of the Duke, who embraced this op- 
portunity to wreak his vengeance upon him. It was 
only when the conquests of Gustavus-Adolphus in Ba- 
varia threatened Austria itself, that he yielded to the 
pressing entreaties of the Elector and the Emperor, and 
effected the long expected union with the former, on 
the humiliating condition that Wallenstein would be 
the chief commander of both armies. Thus the chief 
of the Catholic League, the first Prince of the Empire, 
consented to become the inferior of that Bohemian up- 



102 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 

start, whom lie had formerlj^ refused to take into his 
service. After this step, the Duke of Friedland said 
to his officers : " At last I have forced my mortal enemy 
to implore my pardon and my support. 1 am avenged 
of all the evil he has done me." 

The comhined hostile armies amounted to sixty 
thousand men, and the Swedes had only about iwenty 
thousand to oppose, when they heard that Wallenstein 
intended to attack Nuremberg. Had Gustavus been 
only actuated by egotism, he would, before gathering 
his scattered troops, have avoided the enemy and aban- 
doned the city. But the Magdeburg disaster was not 
obliterated from his memory, and he resolved to per- 
ish with his weak army rather than to expose to the 
savage fury of the Imperialists a city from which he had 
received tokens of sincere devotion and aifection. He 
did not hesitate, and prepared to meet the danger. At 
his arrival, he hastened to surround the town with an 
intrenched camp, which formed, so to say, second ram- 
parts, and enabled him to lodge the soldiers without 
inconvenience to the Nurembergers. Zealously assist- 
ed by the inhabitants of the city and of the surround- 
ing country, tlie Swedish troops had, in a fortnight, 
rinished this immense work. AVhile these operations 
were carried on without the walls, the magistrates ex- 
erted themselves to fill the magazines with provisions 
and ammunition for a long siege, and to organize a 
numerous militia, which maintained order in the city, 
and could, if necessary, help to defend it. " Nurem- 
berg," said Gustavus-Adolphus, "is the apple of my 
eye, and I shall defend it with all my might." The 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 103 

most perfect union prevailed between tlie soldiers and 
the inhabitants. 

Animated bv feelings of mutual confidence and sym- 
pathy, they prepared to receive the enemy, which soon 
arrived. But, instead of attacking the city, Wallen- 
stein pitched his camp directly opposite to it, at less 
than three miles from that of Gustavus-Adolphus, and 
in an impregnable position. "Hitherto," said he, 
"battles enouiijh have been fought; it is now time to 
try anotlier method." lie hoped to conquer the 
Swedes by famine and pestilence. 

Little aware,, however, of the resources and the 
strength of his adversary, "Wallenstein had not taken 
sufl5icient precautions, to avert from himself the fate 
he was designing for others. The peasantry of the 
neighboring country had fled with their property, and 
what little provision remained must be obstinately con- 
tested with the Swedes. The King spared the maga- 
zines within the town, as long as it was possible to 
provision his army from without; and these forays 
produced constant skirmishes between the Croats and 
the Swedes, in which many men were lost without 
benefit to either party. "When this supply fciiled, the 
town opened its magazines to the King, but Wallen- 
stein had to support his troops from a distance. Once 
a large convoy from Bavaria was on its way to him, 
with an escort of a thousand men. Gustavus-Adolphus, 
having received intelligence of its approach, immedi- 
ately sent out a regiment of cavalry to intercept it, 
and the darkness of the night favored the enterprise. 
The whole convoy, with the town in which it was, fell 



10^4 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

into the hands of the Swedes; the imperial escort was 
cut to pieces, about twelve thousand cattle carried off, 
and a thousand wagons, loaded with bread, which 
could not be brought away, were set on fire. Seven 
regiments, which Wallenstein had sent forward to 
cover the entrance of the long and anxiously expected 
convoy, were attacked by the King, and, after an ob- 
ttinate action, driven back into the imperial camp with 
the loss of four hundred men. So many checks and 
difficulties," and so firm and unexpected a resistance 
on the part of the King, made the Duke of Friedland 
repent that he had not hazarded a battle. The strength 
of the Swedish camp rendered an attack impracticable. 
The want of provisions, which began to be felt, the 
contagious diseases, the natural consequence of bad 
food, and a crowded population, and the inactivity 
always connected with camp life, were the causes which 
broke up all discipline and order in the Swedish camp. 
The German troops gave the example of plunder, and 
the remainder of the army found in the aggravation of 
its sufi'erinor a reason for imitatinc; them. These shame- 
ful breaches of discipline, on the maintenance of which 
he had hitherto justly prided himself, severely pained 
the King ; and the vehemence with which he reproached 
the German officers for their negligence, bespoke the 
liveliness of his emotion. He assembled them, June 
29tli, and thus addressed them : " Complaints reach 
me, from all sides, about the conduct of our troops in 
regard to our allies. People complain that the Swedes 
begin to wage war like the Croats. These reproaches 
break my heart, especially since I know that they arc 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPnUS. 105 

but too true. I am innocent of all these disorders; I 
iiave always forbidden and punished them severely. 
It is you yourselves, Germans, who lay waste your 
native country, ransack your fellow-citizens, and drive 
your co-religionists to despair, whom you have sworn 
to protect. As God is my judge, I abhor you ; I loathe 
you; my heart sinks within me, even when I look upon 
you. Ye break my orders; ye are the cause that the 
world curses me, that the tears of poverty follow me, 
that complaints ring in my ear: — ' The King, our friend, 
does us more harm than even Wallenstein, our worst 
enemy.' — If you were true Christians, you would fulfil 
your duties to your country and your brethren, and 
you would remember what I have done for you. It is 
for you that I have ventured my life, and sacrificed my 
peace. It is for you that I have depopulated Sweden, 
stripped my kingdom of its treasures, and spent upon 
you more than forty tuns of gold;* while from your 
German Empire I have not received the least aid, not 
even so much as to buy a miserable doublet. I ask 
nothing of you, and would prefer to return home poor 
and naked to enriching and clothing myself at your 
expense. I gave you a share of all that God had given 
to me ; and had ye regarded my orders, I would gladly 
have shared with you all my future acquisitions. Your 
want of discipline convinces me of your evil intentions, 
whatever cause I might otherwise have to applaud your 
bravery. 



*A tun of gold in Sweden amounts to one hundred thousand 
dollars. 



106 GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

"If you murmur, if you forget God and honor so as 
1 forsake me, I shall surround myself with my Swedes 
and Finlanders;* we shall defend ourselves to the last 
man, and the whole world will see that, being a Chris- 
tian King, I have preferred to give up my life rather 
than to defile by a crime the holy work which God has 
entrusted to me. 

"I request you for God's sake, commune with your- 
selves, ask your consciences. Remember that you will 
render an account to God of your conduct, and that 
you will appear before the judgment-seat of the all- 
seeing heavenly Judge." 

These words made a powerful impression upon the 
hearers, many of whom were touched to tears. When 
afterwards the King saw a stolen cow before the tent 
of a corporal, he delivered the delinquent to the pro- 
vost for punishment, with these words : '' Come, my 
son, it is better I punish you than that God should 
punish not only you, but, on your account, also me 
and all of us together." Likewise two captains, who 
had stolen, were called to account and punished. 

At last the expected succor, brought by the Chan- 
cellor Oxenstiern, arrived in the Swedish camp. This 
reinforcement amounted to nearly fifty thousand men, 
and was attended by a train of sixty pieces of cannon, 
and four thousand bas-nraoje wa2;ons. Gustavus now 
saw himself at the head of an army of nearly seventy 
thousand strong, without reckoning the militia of Nu- 
remberg, which, in case of necessity, could bring into 



* Finland belongs no more to Sweden, but is now a province of 
Kussia. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 107 

tlie field about thirty thousand fighting men, a formid- 
able force opposed to another not less formidable. 

If, before the arrival of the Swedish succors, a want 
of provisions had been felt, the evil was now fearfully 
increased in both camps, for Wallenstein had also re- 
ceived reinforcements from Bavaria. Beside the one 
hundi'ed thousand men confronted to each other, and 
more than fifty thousand horses, in the two armies, and 
beside the inhabitants of Nuremberg, whose number far 
exceeded the Swedish army, there were in the camp of 
Wallenstein fifteen thousand women, with as many 
drivers, and nearly the same number in that of the 
Swedes. The custom of the time permitted the sol- 
dier to carry his family with him into the field. No 
wonder that the necessaries of life rose to an exorbi- 
tant price. All the mills of Nuremberg were insuffi- 
cient to grind the grain, required for each day; and 
fifty thousand pounds of bread, which were daily de- 
livered by the town into the Swedish camp, excited, 
without allaying, the hunger of the soldiers. The 
laudable exertions of the magistrates of Nuremberg 
could not prevent the greater part of the horses from 
dying for want of forage, while the increasing mor- 
tality in the camp consigned more than one hundred 
men daily to the grave. 

To put an end to these distresses, Gustavus-Adol- 
phus, relying on his numerical superiority, left his 
lines on the fifty-fifth day, forming before the enemy 
in order of battle, while he cannonaded the Duke's 
camp from three batteries. But "Wallenstein remained 
immovable in his intrenchments. His plan was to wear 



108 GUSTAVUS'ADOLPHUS., 

out the King by his inactivity, and by the force of 
famine to overcome his resolute determination. Gus- 
tavus, deceived in his hope of forcing a battle, and 
compelled by his increasing necessities, now attempted 
impossibilities, and resolved to storm a position which 
art and nature had combined to render impregnable. 

On the fifty-eighth day of his encampment (Aug. 
24th), he advanced in full order of battle, and easily 
drove the enemy's out-posts before him. The main 
army of the Imperialists occupied steep heights, on 
which the whole of the artillery was placed. Deep 
trenches surrounded inaccessible redoubts, while thick 
barricades and pointed palisades defended the ap- 
proaches to the heights. Against this dangerous post 
Gustavus now directed his attack. The assault was 
furious; the resistance obstinate. Exposed to the 
whole fire of the enemy's artillery, and infuriated by 
the prospect of inevitable death, thes'e determined war- 
riors rushed forward to storm the heights, which dis- 
charged on them a shower of shot. The intrepid band, 
conquered, was obliged to retreat. The assault was 
renewed six times, with no better result. After a ten 
hours' action, a thousand mangled bodies covered the 
field. 

In the mean time, a sharp contest had taken place 
between the imperial cavalry and the left wing of the 
Swedes, with varying success, but with equal intre- 
pidity and loss on both sides. The Duke of Friedland 
and Prince Bernard, of Weimar, had each a horse shot 
under them. The King himself had the sole of his 
boot carried off by a cannon-ball. The combat was 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 109 

maintained with undiminished obstinacy, until the ap- 
proach of night separated the combatants. Two thou- 
sand dead, which Gustavus left behind him on the field, 
testified to the extent of his loss; and the Duke of 
Friedland remained unconquered within his lines. 

For fourteen days after this action, the two armies 
still continued fronting each other, each in the hope 
that the other would first withdraw. Every day re- 
duced their provisions. By the casualties of war and 
sickness, Nuremberg had lost more than ten thousand 
of its inhabitants, and Gustavus-Adolphus nearly twen- 
ty thousand of his soldiers. The fields around the city 
were trampled down, the villages lay in ashes, dead 
bodies infected the air, and bad food, the exhalations 
from so dense a population and so many putrifying 
carcasses, together with the heat of the dog-days, pro- 
duced a desolating pestilence, which raged among men 
and beasts. Affected by the general distress, and de- 
spairing of conquering the determination of the Duke 
of Friedland, the King broke up his camp, on the 8th 
of September, leaving in jNuremberg a garrison suffi- 
cient to shield the city from a surprise. He advanced 
in full order of battle before the enemy, and waited 
four hours in front of the Austrian camp. But Wal- 
lenstein remained motionless, and did not attempt in 
the least to harass his retreat. Gustavus bent his 
course towards Windsheim, in Bavaria, to complete 
the conquest of this country, and afterwards to pene- 
trate into Austria. Wallenstein, as exhausted as him- 
self, had only awaited the retreat of the Swedes to 
commence his own. Five days afterwards he broke 
10 



110 GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. . 

up his camp, and set it on fire. A hundred columns 
of smoke, rising from all the burning villages in the 
neighborhood, announced his retreat, and showed the 
city the fate it had escaped. His army, which lately 
had amounted to sixty-thousand men, had dwindled 
down to about twenty-four thousand, and of these a 
fourth were Bavarians. The Swedes were reduced to 
twenty thousand men, and had left more than twenty 
thousand near Nuremberg. 

To secure the success of his operations in Bavaria, 
Gustavus-Adolphus was going to beleaguer Ingolstadt, 
hoping to retrieve his former repulse, and to deprive 
Maximilian of his surest asylum, when he heard that 
"Wallenstein was devastating Saxony, and making her 
pay dearly for her sympathy with Sweden. At this 
intelligence, his loyalty and faithfulness induced him 
to relinquish the execution of his plan of operation a 
second time. He retraced his steps, and hastened to 
come to the rescue of his ally. 



CHAPTER YII. 




END OF THE LIFE OF GUSTAYU^- 
ADOLPHUS. 

RETURN OF THE SWEDES INTO SAXONY VICTORY AND DEATH OF 

GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS AT .LUTZEN — HIS ADMINISTRATION IN SWE- 
DEN. 

FTER having united his troops with those of 
Bernard of Weimar, who had been despatched to 
■act against Pappenheim, the King of Sweden, 
with twenty thousand veterans, followed the route of 
Wallenstein. He received every where the most af- 
fectionate welcome. Gustavus, who, at the head of 
his army, rode a large white hors^, and was only dis- 
tinguished from the private soldier by the long white 
plume, which he wore on his little gray hat, according 
to the Swedish fashion, was the object of general ad- 
miration, as well as his sun-burnt soldiers, who were 
remarkable by their martial gait. When this gallant 
army stopped anywhere, it did not make the least dis- 
turbance, but respected persons and property. In 
Franconia and Thuringia the Swedes prayed in the 
morning and eveniag with their landlords, and thanked 
them for their hospitality, on leaving. The inhabitants 
of these countries considered these soldiers as members 
of their families, and reluctantly parted from them. 

Ill 



112 GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

An event, wMch they considered as a good omen, 
particularly contributed to make them appreciate the 
kindness of the King of Sweden. Their imagination 
was struck by it so much, that it has been recorded in 
their chronicles and preserved until now. 

When GustaVus-Adolphus approached Pfofflingen, 
he saw a hawk pursuing a lark, which came to seek a 
shelter in his bosom. He took the bird, smiling, in his 
hand, and holding it very gently, lest he might wound 
it, he said: "Poor little bird, may God protect you!" 
Then, when the hawk was out of sight, and the lark 
out of danger, he let it loose, thanking God for having 
given him an opportunity of saving an innocent crea- 
ture. There is in this anecdote a touching allegory of 
the work which Gustavus-Adolphus was performing. 
Austria was to the German Protestants a bird of prey, 
ready to devour them, and it was into the arms of the 
King of Sweden that they had thrown themselves to 
recover their liberty. 

On the 23d of Oo-tober, the different divisions of his 
army met in Arnstadt. Here his Chancellor parted 
with him, and the two friends saw one another for the 
last time. 

At Erfurt, Gustavus-Adolphus found the Queen, 
who was awaiting him. But overwhelmed with busi- 
ness, he could enjoy her presence but little. Wallen- 
stein was at a short distance from the city. 

On the following day, October 28th, 1632, Gustavus 
convened the town council, and spoke to that body in 
the following terms: "I intrust you with my most 
precious jewel, the Qaeen, my well-beloved spouse. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 113 

You know, gentlemen, that all things in this world are 
liable to vicissitudes, and above all war, a scourge 
which God uses to chastise men for their sins. Like 
another, I may meet with misfortune, perhaps death. 
If this is the will of God, show to my beloved wife the 
loyalty, the devotion of which you have always given 
me proofs." 

And as the Queen was bursting into tears, he clasped 
her to his heart and said: "Cheer up ! we shall see 
each other again ; if not in this life, it will be sooner 
or later in the celestial abodes of eternal bliss." 

Then embracing her a last time, he sprang on his 
horse, and rejoined his army, which was starting. 

He reached Naumburg on the 1st of November, 
1632, before the corps, which the Duke of Friedland 
had dispatched for that purpose, could make itself 
master of that place. The inhabitants of the sur- 
rounding country flocked in crowds to look upon the 
hero, the avenger, the great king, who, a year before, 
had first appeared in that quarter, like a guardian 
angel. Shouts of joy every where attended his pro- 
gress ; the people knelt before him, and struggled for 
the honor of touching the sheath of his sword, or the 
hem of his garment. The modest hero disliked this in- 
nocent tribute which a sincerely grateful and admiring 
multitude paid him. "Is it not," said he to his chap- 
liin, "as if this people would make a god of me? Our 
cause prospers indeed; but I fear the vengeance of 
Heaven will punish us for this presumption, and soon 
enough reveal to this deluded multitude my human 
weakness and mortality." 

10* 



114 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

How amiable does Gustavus appear before us at this 
moment, when about to leave us forever! Even in 
the plenitude of success, he declines that homage 
which is due only to the Immortal, and strengthens his 
title to our tears, the nearer the moment approaches 
that is to call them forth ! 

The enemy, which had come too late to take Naum- 
burg, encamped at Weissenfels, a place not quite two 
miles distant from that town. Twice as numerous as 
the Swedes, the Austrians hoped to defeat the latter 
as soon as opportunity presented. Gustavus-Adolphus, 
following the same tactics as at Nuremberg, made pre- 
parations for intrenching himself, with the intention 
of awaiting there the reinforcements, which the Duke 
of Lunenburg was bringing up from Lower-Saxony. 
"Wallenstein did not think it prudent to attack the 
King in his advantageous position, and, almost con- 
vinced that, at this season, he had no reason to appre- 
hend any thing from the Swedes, he put his troops into 
winter quarters, supposing that the enemy would do 
the same at Naumburg. Count Pappenheim was dis- 
patched with eleven thousand men to the assistance of 
Cologne, that was threatened by the Dutch. When 
Gustavus-Adolphus was informed of Pappenheim's de- 
parture, he said: "I believe indeed that God has 
delivered the enemy into my hand;" and, suddenly 
breaking up his camp at Naumburg, he hastened with 
his whole force to attack Wallenstein, now weakened 
to nearly one-half. Notwithstanding his speed, he 
met his adversary only on the evening of the same day 
before Lutzen, and was, to his great regret, obliged to 
defer the battle to the next day. 



GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. " 115 

When the fateful morning of November 6th dawned, 
the King sent for his chaplain, and spent with him an 
hour in prayer. Then he attended the divine service 
which was celebrated every morning in the camp.* 
Kneeling in front of his lines, he offered up his devo- 
tions ; and the whole army, at the same moment, 
dropping on their knees, burst into the following war- 
hymn, f accompanied by military music, which inspired 
the hearts of his soldiers with new ardor : 

Fear not, little flock, the foe 
Who madly seeks your overthrow — 

Dread not his rage and power. 
What though your courage sometimes faints 
His seeming triumph o'er God's saints 

Lasts but a little hour. 

Be of good cheer; your cause belongs 
To Ilim who can avenge your wrongs — 

Leave it to Him, our Lord. 
Though hidden yet from all our eyes, 
*^ .• • He sees the Gideon who shall rise 

To save us and His word. 



* Luther's celebrated hymn : Ein' feste Burg is unser Gott — 
God is our stronghold firm and sure — was usually sung during this 
service. The words in the second stanza," 'Tis Jesus Christ,'^ which 
are the answer to the question, " Askest thou His name," were 
always accompanied with a salute of artillery. This hymn has 
been translated by Miss C. Winkworth in Lyra Germanica I..p, 173. 

f After the battle of Leipzig (Breitenfeld) in 1631, Gustavus- 
Adolphus indited the ideas and words of this hymn, which his 
chaplain. Dr. Fabricius, versified. The above translation is from 
Miss C. Winkworth, and is contained in Lyra Germanica L, p. 17. 
The fourth strophe, which usually is found in German hymn-books, 
not being from Gustavus-Adolphus, but from Samuel Zehner, has 
been omitted. 



3-16 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

As true as God's own word is true, 
Not earth, nor hell, with all their crew 

Against us, ghall lorevail. 
A jest and by-word are they grown ; 
God is with us, we are His own, 

Our victory cannot fail. 



A thick fog covered the plain on whicli the battle 
was to be fought, so that the troops, which were 
closest, could not see one another. The sino-inor of 
hymns and psalms was at times drowned by the roar- 
ing of Wallenstein's cannons, which announced the 
imminent attack. Then the King mounted his horse 
and drew up his army in battle array. Clad only in 
a leathern doublet and surtout, he answered his friends 
who remonstrated with him on the necessity of pro- 
tecting himself from wounds, in a day like this : " God 
is my armor.'' He rode along the ranks to animate 
the courage of his troops. He first addressed the 
Swedes: ^' Dear compatriots and friends, the day has 
come when you must show, what you have learned in 
your numerous battles. You have before you the 
enemy, which you have so long sought. He is neither 
sheltered behind formidable ifetrenchments, nor secured 
by his position on mountains. He is yonder in the 
plain, which opens before you. It is not of his own 
accord, you know it, that he accepts the battle, and 
not because he believes himself sure of the victory; 
no, it is because he cannot longer avoid the encounter 
of our arms. Therefore, be prepared, behave well, as 
becomes brave soldiers. Fight valiantly for your God, 
your country, and your king." 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 117 

After that, lie passed to the left ■wing of the army, 
formed of German auxiliaries, and said to them: 
*' Brothers and loyal companions! I request and ex- 
hort you as Christians and men of honor, to do your 
duty to-day as you have done it previously. About a 
year since, and not far from this place, you defeated 
Tilly and his army. I hope that the enemy which is 
before you will not fare better. March on coura- 
geously; you will fight, not under my command, but 
with and aside of me. I shall myself take the lead. 
I am prepared to venture my life and to shed my 
blood. If you follow me, I trust in God that you will 
achieve a victory, the fruits of which you and your 
descendants will reap. If you are defeated, it is all 
over forever with your religion, your liberty, your 
welfare." 

The soldiers answered the words of their chief with 
shouts of joy and enthusiasm. Gustavus-Adolphus, 
far from participating in their transports, was more 
earnest than usual, and appeared almost melancholy. 
He had made all his arrangements like a man who 
knows that his last hour is drawino- near. He had 
designated the Duke Bernard of Weimar to take the 
command in his stead, if he should perish during the 
battle. The sadness which was expressed in his counte- 
nance, showed the foreboding presentiment of his bosom. 
At about 11 o'clock the fog cleared away, and Llitzen 
was seen in flames, having been set on fire at the com- 
mand of the. Duke, to prevent his being Outflanked on 
that side. When the two armies were within sight, 
Gustavus-Adolphus bowed his head and ofi"ered his 



118 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

last prayer with unusual fervor. Then, raising his 
eyes towards heaven, and with his clasped hands on 
the hilt of his sword, he cried: ''Jesus, Jesus, help 
me fight to-day for the glory of Thy holy name!" He 
then brandished his sword above his head, and added: 
"Forward, in the name of the Lord!" The charge 
was now sounded ; the cavalry rushed upon the enemy, 
and the infantry advanced against the trenches. "God 
with us!" was the war-cry of the Swedes. "Jesus 
Mary!" that of the Imperialists. 

Received by a tremendous fire of musketry and 
heavy artillery, the Swedish battalions maintained the 
attack with undaunted courage, forced the enemy's 
musketeers to abandon their posts, passed the trenches 
and carried and turned a battery against their adver- 
saries. They pressed forward with irresistible impe- 
tuosity ; the first of the five Imperial brigades was im- 
mediately routed, the second soon after, and the third 
put to flight. With the rapidity of lightning Wallen- 
stein was on the spot, to rally his discomfited troops; 
and his powerful word was sufficient to stop the flight 
of the fugitives. Supported by three regiments of 
cavalry, the vanquished brigades, forming anew, faced 
the enemy, and pressed vigorously into the broken 
ranks of the Swedes. A murderous conflict ensued. 
The nearness of the enemy left no room for fire-arms, 
the fury of the attack, no time for loading ; man was 
matched to man, the useless musket exchanged for the 
sword and pike. Overpowered by numbers, the wea- 
ried Swedes at last retired beyond the trenches, and 
the captured battery is lost by the retreat. A thou- 



Eh 




GUSTAVUS-AD0LPHU3. 119 

sand mangled bodies already strewed the plain, and as 
yet not a single step of ground had been won. 

In the mean time, the King's right wing, led by him- 
self, had fallen upon the enemy's left. The first im- 
petuous shock of the heavy Finland Cuirassiers dis- 
persed the lightly mounted Poles and Croats, who 
were posted here, and their disorderly flight spread 
terror and confusion among the rest of the cavalry. 
At this moment notice was brouo;ht to the Kino;, that 
his infantry were retreating over the trenches, and 
also that his left wing, exposed to a severe fire, was 
beginning to give way. With rapid decision he commit- 
ted to General Horn the pursuit of the enemy's left, 
while he hastened, at the head of a regiment, to repair 
the disorder of his left wing. His noble charger bore 
him, with the velocity of lightning, across the trenches, 
but the squadrons that followed could not come on 
with the same speed, and only a few horsemen, among 
whom was Francis Albert, Duke of Saxe-Lauenburg, 
were able to keep up with the King. He rode directly 
to the place where his infantry were most closely 
pressed, and while he was reconnoitering the enemy's 
line for an exposed point of attack, the shortness of 
his sight unfortunately led him too close to their ranks. 
An Imperial corporal, remarking that every one re- 
spectfully made way for him as he rode along, imme- 
diately ordered a musketeer to take aim at him. 
"Fire at him yonder," said he; " that must be a man 
of consequence." The soldier fired, and the King's 
left arm was shattered. At that moment his squadrons 
came hurrying up, and a confused cry of "the King 



120 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

bleeds! the King is shot!" spread terror and conster- 
nation through all the ranks. — "It is nothing; follow 
me," cried the King, collecting his whole force; but 
overcome bj pain, and nearly fainting, he requested 
the Duke of Lauenburg, in French, to lead him unob- 
served out of the tumult, ^^hile the Duke proceeded 
towards the right wing with the King, making a long 
circuit to keep this discouraging sight from the de- 
jected infantry, his majesty received a second shot 
through the back, which deprived him of his remaining 
strength. "Brother," said he, in a dying voice, "I 
have enough ! look only to your own life." At the 
same moment, he fell from his horse, pierced by several 
more shots; and, abandoned by all his attendants,* 



■^ The young page, Leubelfingen, was tlie only one who remained 
with the King, and was pierced, at his side, by a stab of a sword, 
which ran through his body. He, however, survived the battle a 
few days, and it was he who related, that at 1 o'clock in the after- 
noon hostile cuirassiers had come, one of whom shot the King 
through the head, while others pierced him with their swords and 
robbed him. A huge stone, still known under the name of Si07ie 
of the Swedes, was rolled on the spot where the King had fallen. — 
As only a few persons witnessed the last moments of the King, re- 
ports of different kinds were spread about his death. Common 
people could not realize that Gustavus-Adolphus should have fal- 
len like a private soldier ; they thought that the death of an ex- 
traordinary man ought to have been extraordinary. Tne many 
former attempts against his life suggested the idea that the hand 
of an assassin must have interrupted his brilliaiit career. How- 
ever, the stories related differed widely. It was generally be- 
lieved that the duke Francis-A(bert of Saxe-Lauenburg, hired by 
the Emperor or by Wallenstein, and actuated by the desire of tak- 
ing revenge for an insult received in his youth from Gustavus- 
Adolphus, murdered him. This rumor has little or no foundation. 



GUSTAYUS-ADOLPIIUS. 121 

lie breathed his last amid a plundering band of 
Croats. His charger, flying without its rider, and 
covered with blood, soon made known to the Swedish 
cavalry the fall of their king. They rushed madly 
(forward to rescue his corpse from the hands of the 
enemy; a murderous conflict ensued over the body, 
till his mangled remains were buried beneath a heap 
of slain. 

The mournful tidings soon ran through the Swedish 
army ; but, instead of destroying the courage of these 
brave troops, it but stirred up a new, a wild and con- 
suming flame. Life had lessened in value, now that 
the most sacred hfe of all was gone; death had no 
terrors for the lowly, since the anointed head was not 
spared. With the fury of lions, the Upland, Smaland, 
Finland, East and West Gothland regiments rushed a 
second time uj)on the left wing of the enemy, which, 
already making but feeble resistance to Greneral Horn, 
was now entirely beaten from the field. Bernard, 
Duke of S axe- Weimar, gave to the bereaved Swedes 
a noble leader in his own person ; and the spirit of 
Gustavus led his victorious squadrons anew. The Im- 
perialists being vigorously pressed upon every where, 
their resistance became gradually less. Chance con- 
spired with Swedish valor to complete the defeat. 
The Imperial powder-wagons took fire, and, with a 
tremendous explosion, grenades and bombs filled the 
air. The enemy, now in confusion, thought they were 
attacked in the rear, while the Swedish brigades 
pressed them in front. Their courage began to fail 
them. Their left wing was already beaten, their right 
11 



122 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPIIUS. 

wavering, and their artillery in the hands of the 
Swedes. The battle seemed to be almost decided, 
wlien Pappenheim appeared on the field with his cui- 
rassiers and dragoons, and a new battle was to be 
fought. 

The order which recalled the General to Llitzen, had 
reached him in Ilalle. Without trying to collect his 
scattered infantry, he ordered eight' regiments of 
cavalry to mount, and, at their head, he repaired with 
all speed to Llitzen to share in the battle. His unex- 
pected appearance revived the drooping courage of the 
Imperialists. The closely-serried battalions of the 
Swedes were, after a tremendous conflict, again driven 
across the trenches. An ardent desire to encounter 
the King in person, carried Pappenheim into the 
thickest of the fight, where he thought his noble oppo- 
nent was most surely to be met. Gustavus had also 
expressed a wish to meet his brave antagonist, but 
these hostile wishes remained ungratified; death first 
brou2;ht to2:ether these two heroes. Two musket-balls 
pierced the breast of Pappenheim, and his men forcibly 
carried him from the field. 

With Pappenheim, the good fortune of the Impe- 
rialists departed. The cavalry of the left wing, no 
sooner missed their victorious leader, than they gave 
up every thing for lost, and abandoned the field of 
battle in spiritless despair. The right wing fell into 
the same confusion, with the exception of a few regi- 
ments which kept the ground. The Swedish infantry, 
with prompt determination, made a final and decisive 
charge, and when night and darkness at last put an 



i 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 123 

end to the desperate figlit, it remained in the posses- 
sion of the battle-fiekl. 

The Duke of Friedland had retreated to Leipzig, 
and was followed on the morrow by the scattered re- 
mains of his army, without artillery, without colors, 
and almost without arms. Of the two armies, more 
than nine thousand men lay dead, a still greater 
number were wounded; and among the Imperialists 
scarcely a man escaped from the field uninjured. The 
entire plain of Llitzen was strewed with the wounded, 
the dying and the dead. 

Pappenheim died the day after this bloody battle, 
of his wounds, at Leipzig, and Wallenstein soon* after 
abandoned all Saxony to the victors, who possessed 
themselves of all the strongholds, occupied by the 
Austrians. 

It was a dear conquest, a sad triumph ! It was not 
until the fury of the contest was over, that the full 
weight of the loss sustained was felt, and the shout of 
triumph died away into a silent, gloomy despair. He 
who had led them to the charge, returned not with 
them ; there he lies upon the field which he had won, 
mingled with the dead bodies of the common crowd. 
After a long and almost fruitless search, the corpse of 
the King was found, stripped by the rude hand of 
plunderers, of its ornaments and clothes, beneath a 

* Wallenstein, first forced by liis defeat to inactivity, later beat 
the Swedes at Steinau, thanks to the incapacity of the Count of 
Thurn, who commanded them, and to their small number. After- 
wards, he conspired against the Emperor, who had him assassi- 
nated February 25th, 1G34. A melancholy death, but worthy of 
this illustrious adventurer. 



124 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. - 

heap of dead. Covered with blood and wounds, 
trampled beneath the horses' hoofs, it was so disfigured, 
that it could scarcely be recognized. It was first re- 
moved to the village of Meuchen, deposited there in 
a plain cofiin, made by the schoolmaster, who was a 
joiner by trade, and laid out before the altar. A 
funeral service, in which the schoolmaster performed 
the office of a minister, and a Swedish commander de- 
livered an oration, was celebrated in the church of the 
place. The next day, the mortal remains of the hero 
were conveyed to Weissenfels, where a druggist, named 
Kasparius, who was charged with embalming them, 
found that the King had received nine wounds. — Here 
his remains were delivered up to the lamentations of 
his soldiers, and the last embraces of the Queen. The 
first tribute had been paid to revenge, and blood had 
atoned for the blood of the monarch; but now afi'ec- 
tion assumes its rights, and tears of grief must flow 
for the man. The universal sorrow absorbs all indi- 
vidual woes. The generals, still stupefied by the un- 
expected blow, stood speechless and motionless around 
his bier, and no one trusted himself sufficiently to con- 
template the full extent of their loss. 

The following summer, the body was sent from 
Saxony to the Baltic shore. The most poignant re- 
grets were manifested in all places through which the 
procession passed. Protestant Germany felt that no- 
thing could compensate for the irretrievable loss of her 
liberator. From Wolgast, in Pomerania, the body 
was taken to Sweden, accompanied by the inconsolable 
Queen, Maria-Eleanor, and a deputation of the Senate. 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 125 

After a prosperous passage, the fleet arrived, August 
8tli, at Njkjoeping. When it approached the Swedish 
shore, the heavens became overcast with dark clouds, 
which soon resolved themselves into a heavy rain, as 
thouo;h Sweden intended to receive the remains of the 
greatest and the most beloved of her sons in tears. 

In compliance with the desire of the Queen, who 
was not willing to s;eparate herself from the mortal re- 
mains of her consort, and desired to keep them to the 
moment, when she could rest with them in the same 
tomb, the solemn funeral, which was to take place at 
Stockholm, was postponed to June 21st, 1634. It was 
then celebrated with the utmost pomp, and in the 
midst of universal affliction. The coffin was entombed 
in the church of Ridderholm, which Gustavus-Adolphus 
had himself chosen for his burial-place. A magnifi- 
cent mausoleum, which still subsists, had been erected 
for him. On seven sides of this monument short sen- 
tences, relating to his achievements, and qualities, are 
engraved. Beneath the cross which surmounts it, a 
pelican, feeding its young with his own blood, has been 
represented. A striking emblem, which very ade- 
quately expresses the most characteristic feature of 
the Swedish hero, and sums up his whole life, which 
was but a long and bloody self-devotion. 

At the death of Gustavus-Adolphus, we may indeed, 
with good reason, say: "There is a prince and a great 
man fallen this day in Israel," 2 Sam. iii. 38. 

Gustavus-Adolphus died in the 38th year of his life. 

What would he have done, if God had permitted 
him to live longer ? — Did he aspire, as has been main- 

11* 



126 GUSTAYUS-ADOLPHUS. 

tained, after tlie Imperial crown, and has death, hy 
destroying his ambitious projects, hindered him from 
tarnishing his glory? — We cannot answer these ques- 
tions. His life was exempt from all self-interest, and, 
to his last hour, he remained faithful to his holy mis- 
sion. He fought for the gospel and for liberty. God 
caused the seed, which he had sown and moistened 
with his blood, to spring up and ripen. — Truth is im- 
mortal, and even its enemies are often, against their 
will and unwittingly, the tools chosen by Providence 
to favor its unavoidable triumph. "Who would have 
believed, when the hero of the !N"orth, the most re- 
doubtable defender of Reformation, fell, that not the 
achievements of his gallant successors, but the policy 
of two Cardinals would give to Germany that religious 
liberty, which she had pursued during thirty years, and 
would thus secure the future of Protestantism in 
Europe?"^ 

When Gustavus-Adolphus was conjured to spare his 
life, he used to answer : ''Almighty God lives." The 
unexpected issue of this long and bloody war, the 
manner in which the work of the great King of Sweden 
was accomplished, has justified this pious expression, 



* After Gustavus-Adolphus, the war, save a few reverses, was 
continued to the honor of Sweden. His genius was wanting to 
take advantage of all the victories, and to give unity to all these 
campaigns. But France, always jealous of Austria's power, in- 
terfered through the Cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin ; and when 
the Swedish General Wrangel had defeated, with the help of 
Turenne, the Imperialists, at Sommerhausen, near that same 
brook Lech, where sixteen years before, Gustavus-Adolphus had 
also conquered them, Austria yielded, and the peace of Westpha- 
lia was signed (1G48). 



GUSTAVCS-ADOLPHUS. 127 

whicli moreover is confirmed by many otlier facts of 
history, where the irresistible and consoling poAver of 
the Lord of the universe, continually manifests itself 
by disappointing the previsions of man, and baffling 
his combinations. 

The death of few men has made so deep an impres- 
sion on the world as that of our hero. 

As far as his name was known, it was a ray of hope 
to the oppressed. Even the Greek, when he heard it, 
dreamed of liberty ; and at the holy sepulchre, prayers 
were offered for the success of his arms. We are 
therefore not surprised to see those of his cotempora- 
ries, who were personally acquainted with him, or who, 
thanks to his exertions, enjoyed the invaluable privi- 
lege of religious liberty, bewail his loss as that of a 
father, because they considered their most cherished 
hopes buried with him. So great was the power and 
the lustre of his virtues, that the Pope recognized them 
by saying: "He is the greatest King in the world;" 
and that Wallenstein, his inveterate enemy, when in- 
formed of his death, could not forbear paying homage 
to them in these words: "It is well for him and me 
that he is gone. The German Empire does not require 
two such leaders." 

In his person were blended the most solemn and 
brilliant qualities. We have seen his deep faith, his 
firm piety, his inflexible justice and his unalterable 
kindness, his courage, his touching tenderness to his 
family : all the virtues of the man and hero, united to 
a military genius which could be equalled, but not sur- 
passed. 



128 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 

He completely transformed the science of war. He 
relied less on the impetus of masses of soldiers, on walls 
or scientifical fortifications, than on moral force. 
Yv^hat was still more beautiful than his tactics, was the 
discipline which he introduced into his armj, and his 
martial law, in which severity rests upon the love of 
justice and the fear of God. ^^One can," he used to 
say, ''be a bold combatant, but not a good soldier, 
w^ithout being a good Christian." 

But Gustavus-Adolphus was not only a great cap- 
tain and an excellent Christian, he was also an admin- 
istrator c L the highest order, and proved that he was 
not less able to govern a country than to be the leader 
of an army. In the very midst of his camps his mind 
w^as not -exclusively engrossed with the execution of 
his strategic plans, but found also time to devote to 
the internal improvements which his kingdom required. 
He made a penal code, appointed new courts and re- 
gulated the jurisprudence. He promoted commerce 
by wise decrees, and rendered it prosperous by favor- 
ing a great number of industrial associations, and by 
inducing skillful workmen from foreign countries to set- 
tle in his States. Sweden is indebted to him for her 
first manufactories of arms and paper, her breweries, 
tanneries, etc. 

He regulated the administration of the provinces, 
encouraged, in particular, .instruction in the difi'erent 
classes of Swedish society, and contributed much to 
the enlightenment of the nation by the organization of 
high schools. He secured to the Professors suitable 
salaries, and, in exchange, asked of them guaranties of 
learning and morality. He purified the Universities, 



GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS. 129 

"Wjiere, according to 'his own expression, there were 
"instructors who neither respected themselves, nor 
performed their mission." He assisted poor, but in- 
telligent and industrious students, and enabled them 
to complete their education. He founded the Univer- 
sity of Dorpat, and made that of Upsal a donation of 
the private property of his family. 

Finally, he intended giving to Sweden a Canstitu- 
tion destined to inau^nrate a more liberal o;overnment, 
when he was snatched away from the affection of his 
subjects. 

Without a few imperfections, which are the common 
lot of frail humanity, and which, with him,^were mostly 
the result of good qualities carried to excess, he could 
have been considered higher than human nature, but 
death, according to his own previsions, put him on a 
level with other men, and most memorably exemplified 
our frailty. 

We understand the feelings which caused the people 
of Augsburg to be moved to tears, when, thanks to 
Gustavus-Adolphus, they enjoyed again the privilege 
of attending evangelical worship, of which they had 
been so long deprived, and the sentiments which 
prompted the grateful inhabitants of Saxony to stretch 
out their hands towards their deliverer, on bended 
knees, — but these feelings, however respectable, have 
become foreign to our age. We see in him the Chris- 
tian hero, whom Providence has raised to contend 
with carnal weapons for the pure doctrine of the gos- 
pel, and to secure religious liberty to his oppressed 
brethren. Endowed by God with the qualities and 



130 GUSTAVUS-ADOLPHUS, 

talents necessary to accomplish his great mission, he 
has nobly performed his part in that great drama. In 
1630, when first he appeared on the scene as the de- 
fender of the Reformation, the free exercise of the 
Protestant religion was gravely endangered, and 
nearly all seemed irretrievably lost. Had Gustavus- 
Adolphus not entered the lists, Austria would probably 
have succeeded in annihilating by the force of arms 
the work, on the success of which Luther and his noble 
fellow-laborers had bestowed for many years their un- 
wearied exertions, and the world, for some time, would 
have been deprived of the benefits of Reformation. 

Protestants must gratefully acknowledge that, next 
to God, their ancestors are indebted to the efi'orts of 
Gustavus-Adolphus for the enjoyment of equal rights 
with Catholics, which were conceded to them in 1648, 
by the treaty of peace of "Westphalia. Thirty years of 
bloody warfare were required to have religious tolera- 
tion and liberty inscribed in the public law of Ger- 
many. 

In the 19th century, a grateful posterity celebrated 

the second anniversary of the demise of this Christian 
hero, whom Protestant Germany appreciates and re- 
spects no less than Sweden, his native country. It 
was then resolved to raise, in honor of his memory, not 
a monumelit of brass or marble, but to lay the foun- 
dation of an Institution, the only aim of which should 
be, to foster and spread Evangelical Protestantism. 
This institution, known as the Gustavus-Adolphus 
Society, has nobly answered this purpose and is a monu- 
ment worthy of the great man whose name it bears. 



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